US$127 an Ounce Two Years Ago. US$1,492 an Ounce Now.

Negative US$53 per ounce.

That was the margin over AISC at Sibanye-Stillwater's South African gold operations in the second half of 2023. The price the division received did not cover its all-in sustaining cost.

Five half-years later, it is US$1,492.

Across the two years from H1 2024 to H1 2026, the division produced 15% less gold at a 49% higher all-in sustaining cost. The realised price rose US$2,392 an ounce. The cost rose US$1,027. The difference is the margin.

H1 2026 landed at US$4,597 an ounce received against AISC of US$3,105, and adjusted EBITDA of R8,995 million, a record for the division.

So the number that matters here is not the earnings. It is US$3,105.

That is the gold price this division now needs simply to cover its all-in sustaining cost. Thirty months ago, it needed US$2,008. Anyone underwriting a gold producer on this earnings cycle is underwriting a price, not an orebody.

The same filing shows what management is doing about it, and it deserves credit. Underground production fell 9% in the half. Surface production rose 13%. The stated intent is a shallower, lower-risk, longer-life portfolio, and the board has approved Burnstone at roughly 130,000 ounces a year. That is a company spending a price window on structural change rather than harvesting it.

Which is the real test right now.

At this gold price, almost every producer's income statement reads like a turnaround. The ones worth owning are using the window to move down the cost curve. A screen ranked on earnings growth cannot tell you which is which. A screen ranked on break-even and reinvestment can.

Rank producers on what they need gold to do, not on what gold has already done for them.

Six half-year filings, one row each, one afternoon to line them up. That should take minutes, not hours.

Less searching. More strategising.™