Zijin Needs 58 Tonnes of H2 Gold to Hit Its 105-Tonne Target

Zijin Mining has made gold one of the fastest-growing parts of its global mining portfolio, but its 2026 target now demands a stronger second half than the first. The Chinese miner produced 47 tonnes of mined gold in the six months to June, up 13% year on year, against full-year guidance of 105 tonnes. That leaves 58 tonnes to produce in the second half - roughly 23% more than H1 output.

The gap matters because Zijin’s first-half growth was not purely organic. Two large acquisitions completed in 2025 are now contributing a full six months of production: Akyem in Ghana and Raygorodok in Kazakhstan. In H1 2026, Akyem produced 128,000 ounces on a 100% basis and Raygorodok 106,000 ounces. Zijin reports an 85% attributable interest in each. Together they supplied about 234,000 ounces, or roughly 7.3 tonnes, of mine output before ownership adjustments.

That acquisition contribution helped lift Zijin’s mined-gold production from 41 tonnes in H1 2025 to 47 tonnes this year. The company produced 90 tonnes in all of 2025. On those reported figures, H2 2025 output was about 49 tonnes, which means the 58 tonnes required in H2 2026 would also be around 18% above the comparable implied second-half level.

The portfolio is broad enough to make that target plausible, but it is not automatic. Zijin’s H1 table shows Buritica in Colombia at 135,000 ounces, Akyem at 128,000, Longnan at 122,000, Rosebel in Suriname at 122,000, Norton Gold Fields in Australia at 122,000 and Raygorodok at 106,000. Zeravshan in Tajikistan produced 96,000 ounces, while Shanxi Zijin and Serbia Zijin Mining contributed 83,000 and 80,000 ounces respectively. That diversity reduces dependence on any single mine, but it shifts the execution test to whether several operations can expand simultaneously.

Akyem is one of the clearest sources of upside. Zijin completed the US$1 billion acquisition from Newmont in April 2025 and later secured parliamentary ratification of its key Ghanaian mining leases. The company says Akyem has 34.6 tonnes of reserves at an average grade of 1.35 grams per tonne plus 54.4 tonnes of resources outside reserves, with another 83 tonnes classified as potential underground resources. Its 8.5-million-tonne-per-year CIL plant gives Zijin a large installed processing base, but the mine’s recent production history also shows why execution matters: annual output fell from 13.1 tonnes in 2022 to 6.4 tonnes in 2024 before the change of ownership.

Raygorodok provides a second lever. Zijin Gold International completed the US$1.2 billion acquisition in October 2025. The Kazakhstan operation combines heap leaching and a carbon-in-pulp plant and is studying a debottlenecking and expansion program that could lift total mining and processing capacity to 16 million tonnes a year. Zijin says annual gold output could exceed 10 tonnes if that expansion is implemented. H1 production of 106,000 ounces shows the mine is already meaningful, but the larger expansion is still a future option rather than embedded current capacity.

The gold growth is financially important even for a diversified copper-gold-lithium group. In H1 2025, Zijin said mined gold contributed 38.6% of gross profit, almost matching copper. For H1 2026, group revenue rose to about RMB194.2 billion and basic earnings per share reached RMB1.473, up 68% year on year. The company also declared an RMB11.1 billion interim dividend and said cash dividends over the next three years should equal 35% of aggregate distributable profit.

That creates a useful discipline for the gold strategy. Acquisitions can add ounces quickly, but they also need to translate into sustained mine-level cash generation if Zijin is simultaneously funding copper, lithium and further global expansion. Akyem and Raygorodok have already moved the production base higher; the next question is how much additional output comes from operating improvements rather than another transaction.

The near-term catalyst is therefore operational rather than corporate. To hit 105 tonnes, Zijin needs an average of about 9.7 tonnes of mined gold per month in H2, compared with roughly 7.8 tonnes per month in H1. Investors should watch second-half production from Akyem, Raygorodok, Rosebel, Buritica and the company’s Chinese mines for evidence that the portfolio can deliver that acceleration. Missing the target would not erase the acquisition-led growth, but it would show that the step from a 90-tonne producer to a sustainable 100-tonne-plus producer is harder than the headline M&A numbers suggest.