Unless you've been living under a rock, you'd probably be aware by now of the extraordinary performance run that gold, and ASX gold stocks by extension, have been on over the past year or two, but particularly over the past few months.
As we've covered extensively here at the Motley Fool, gold has gone from US$1200 an ounce in 2019 to US$1,700 an ounce by late 2023. This time last year, that ounce was worth just under US$2,800, but, in the past 24 hours, it has just broken through US$5,300 for the first time ever.
Over just 2026 to date, we've seen gold jump from US$4,300 to US$5,300, a gain worth almost 25%.
Extraordinary stuff. We've already discussed how investors can buy, or at least invest in, gold itself this month. But today, let's talk about how this unprecedented runup has affected the shares of one of the ASX's largest gold stocks.
Evolution Mining Ltd (ASX: EVN) may not be the largest official gold stock on the Australian share market. That title technically belongs to the US-listed Newmont Corporation (ASX: NEM). But Evolution is one of the largest gold stocks that exclusively calls the ASX home, behind only Northern Star Resources Ltd (ASX: NST).
As such, investors could happily expect that gold's booming price has treated this company very well. But just how well? Let's investigate a hypothetical scenario: an investor buying $10,000 worth of Evolution shares a year ago and see how they'd be faring today.
Meet the ASX gold stock that has almost tripled in 12 months
So, one year ago today, Evolution stock was about to close at $5.64 a share. If one had bought $10,000 worth of this ASX gold stock's shares, they would have picked up 1,773 shares.
Today, Evolution shares are trading at $15.32 each at the time of writing. That means those 1,773 shares would be worth $27,162.36. Yep, this gold stock has almost tripled in value since January 2025, with investors bagging a 171.6% capital return.
But that's not the only profit that this ASX gold stock made for its shareholders over the past 12 months. Evolution also paid out two dividends.
The first of these dividends was the interim April payout, worth 7 cents per share. The second was the final dividend from October, worth 13 cents per share. Both dividends were fully franked.
This annual total of 20 cents per share means our investor would have received an additional $354.60 in dividend income over the past 12 months, lifting their overall capital to $27,516.96. That's a return of 175.2% on the original $10,000 investment.
