Contributor driven miner and explorer list

The contributor driven miner and explorer list goes back nearly a decade, but only few of the original contributor picks have been maintained throughout that period.

Persistently lagging the metals

The last downturn of gold and silver brought the yellow metal to a Thursday close of $1266.2 to end the week at 1273.2, easing barely 0.53% over the week. However the HUI plunged 5.31% leveraging gold down tenfold. Miners have been persistently lagging the metals for most of 2017. 

Regression between the HUI miners index and the Gold Price

The miners rally since end January 2016 has been almost miraculous, with the HUI index more than doubling over less than six months. Since mid August however, much of the gains have evaporated. That doesn't come as a surprise because gold is back down to around $1260, from its 'lofty high' over $1360/oz both in the second week of July and early August.
Graphs were updated on April 25, 2017.

Gold miner bear market starting its fifth year

As we start a new year, it's time to make an update on the situation of gold and silver miners, using the approach you also find in the 'gold miner pulse' blog page and/or the miner performance page. Those pages have been updated with fresh information as of Dec 31st, 2015.
Several more detailed articles, using a similar approach, have been published (a good read for the more long term perspective):

1. Miners relative to precious metals: a tactical approach; (July 2, 2012)
2. Miners relative to precious metals: An update on 2012 (Jan 13, 2013)
3. Anatomy of a gold miner bear market (Dec 30, 2013)
4. Three year slide of precious metal miners (Dec 31, 2014)

During 2011-13 and even over the long haul, the relative performance of mining majors to the precious metals they produce had been disappointing for major gold miners, even while the metals were in a solid uptrend.  See: Gold miners: three decades for naught or Decades of underperformance

This blog article has a time perspective covering years or decades, but is also monitoring whether the trends observed are persisting.

Precious metals retreating push miners down the cliff

By mid October miner sentiment had improved as gold broke above $1180, but there's little left of that optimism. With gold closing October at $1141.7, down 1.9% over the week, the yellow metal has given back about half of its October gains.  Silver at $15.535 (-1.7%) doesn't do much better. The white metal only briefly regained $16 by mid October.

Elite miners and explorers ... or what's left of them

Since almost five years, I've been monitoring how the precious metal miners and explorers covered in the Gold Miner Pulse database fluctuate up and more often down. From a majority of gains over losses few months after the start in Nov 2010, we have evolved to only five long term gains left.

Gold and the miners: identifying the bear market logic

Irrespective whether the latest precious metal recovery sets off a miners rally or is just another dead cat bounce, it 's important recognizing the underlying logic in the trends of gold miners (the HUI index) relative to gold.