Shares in Barton Gold Holdings Ltd (ASX: BGD) have been pretty much steady over the past year, but according to the team at Canaccord Genuity, that could be about to change.
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Big things in store for this ASX gold company
CG has initiated coverage on Barton Gold with a speculative buy rating and a bullish price target, which I'll get to shortly.
First, let's look at why they like the company.
The CG team said Barton had done a good job of building a large gold development portfolio in South Australia "through a combination of opportunistic asset acquisitions, infrastructure ownership deals and disciplined capital management''.
They added:
The company has consolidated a 2.2Moz Au and 3.1Moz Ag resource base across four projects, acquired strategic assets including the Wudinna Gold Project and the region's only gold processing facility, the Central Gawler Mill (CGM), and generated more than A$13m of non-dilutive cash through asset monetisation initiatives. In our view, few junior developers have built a comparable regional platform while maintaining such a measured approach to shareholder dilution. BGD's portfolio is underpinned by two core development assets: Tunkillia and Challenger.
The broker believes the company's value driver is the Tunkillia project, where Barton has delineated to date 1.6 million ounces of gold and 3.1 million ounces of silver.
A scoping study released in May 2025 envisaged an eight-year mining plan with a capital cost of $452 million; however, recently completed resource drilling is expected to support further improvements, CG said.
The broker added:
We view Tunkillia as one of the more compelling undeveloped gold projects in Australia given its scale, production profile, meaningful silver credits and overall similarity to Capricorn Metals Ltd's (ASX: CMM) Karlawinda gold mine.
CG said Barton's stage one strategy involved restarting the Challenger gold mine and the associated Central Gawler Mill (CGM), "creating a potential pathway to near-term producer status and an internal source of cash flow to assist Tunkillia's development''.
They added:
Challenger hosts 313koz Au across tailings, open pit and underground resources, while the fully permitted 600ktpa CGM produced ~1.2Moz historically and is estimated to require only ~A$26m of refurbishment capital. A definitive feasibility study is underway evaluating an initial 3-4 year operation based largely on tailings retreatment and near-surface feed, preserving the larger underground opportunity for future development.
Beyond Tunkillia and Challenger, Barton holds additional regional growth prospects, CG said, including the Perseverance Mine and the Tolmer silver-gold discovery.
Shares looking cheap
CG has a price target of $2.05 for Barton Gold shares, compared to the current $1.02.
