Hey Yev, that is very kind of you, though the likes of
@Joelstar (and many others) are who you should really follow (as they are wisest where it counts, entering and exiting stocks, I am a buy and hold investor... one of the last possibly! ha), as whilst I do enjoy posting on HC, it's purely for informative reasons (I just love to discuss stocks in all things, but I am weak at Technical Analysis, luckily... patience and reading a crap load seem to help me from making too many mistakes).
In saying that, it's a great question and.... from the get go, I reduced most of my holdings in RMS (other than my superannuation), as RMS outperformed most last year with Penny kicking in (to be clear, I did not time it perfectly at all, but... I was able to put my RMS capital to good use).
I think RMS is arguably one of the best run ASX mid tier producers, especially because it has never had the luxury of having excellent assets (the likes of CMM... yes management are the best, but... the assets they have mirror them, RMS has a great team, but Mt Magnet is a 100 year old camp and as such, is always going to lag better assets, just how it is and arguably, always will be).
Now, in saying that, WGX is very similar, even with the recent merger with Karora, the assets in the Murchison and Southern Gold fields are not new (although.... I think Beta sort of is, especially when it had all the sunken infrastructure from the Nickel mining, but this is very rare). The major difference for WGX and RMS right now is... scale. The MD at WGX has, since I first heard him speak, has saved the company (though of course, it's the people on the ground that truly saved WGX, as without them, the mines would just sit idle, and WB knows this and never forgets to praise the real power behind WGX).
Right now, RMS have 2 U/G mines operating, Penny and Galaxy.
Penny is high grade, but has less than 2 years of feed (at only 200kt p.a).
Galaxy is the main U/G mine for Mt Magnet with 5 years of mine life (though they will extend it).
Basically, they will mine around 440kt p.a. This is almost 1/3 of WGX 2 major Murchison mines, and just 1/5 of Beta Hunt. Scale.... just a huge difference.
As you mention, RMS production profile is... a clear issue, it has been for about 3 years, which ties in with RMS efforts to acquire another production hub (but they failed to do so). RMS will be shutting their second production plant (Edna May early CY25). They have another asset which needs a plant built, but that is 2-3 years away at a minimum, so I just discount it for now.
Now it gets trickier to show WGX production profile over the long term, because, U/G mines are, usually shorter life, but see continual extensions due to drilling. WGX has been working very hard to change this. Every U/G mine in production for WGX now have a minimum 3 years of reserves (mine life).
Great Fingall has 8 years.
Big Bell has 16 years.
Beta Hunt has 7 years.
Starlight has 4 years.
Bluebird/South Junction had 3 years (closer to 5 right now)
Fender has 3 years (their smallest U/G mine).
(I am also going to ignore Two Boys U/G as it's small scale, though perhaps WGX might start to give more clarity on it's potential).
All of the above mines are open and IMHO, very likely to be extended further.
So, for WGX.. their mines are all expanding, especially in throughput (in fact, every single U/G mine...)
WGX have 3x the reserves.
WGX have 40% higher production, but, in 18-24 months it will be 100% higher than RMS and in 3 years, it will be 200% higher than RMS (this is one of the reasons that I think above all else, if we are only talking about RMS/WGX, WGX will pull ahead valuation wise).
Just because I can, I have played around with WGX graph (I won't push WGXs figures higher until next week, when they release FY25 guidance).
Though either way, with Regis (RRL) now sub 400k, and RED5 now just over 400k, I think WGX has a clear shot at becoming the 3rd largest producer in FY25 in Australia, and firmly cementing that in FY26 by a large margin.
Yet, WGX market cap is approx $2.8 billion.
Whilst the MoM team made some great points regarding the FY24 cash generation, they also rightly pointed out that WGX spent $160m on non-sustaining capex to supercharge and develop it's mines. Whist RMS.... have been doing everything possible to not spend any capex, to enhance their cash generation. Which is fine, except it means that it's mines are not expanding etc.
So.... I am not here to offer financial advice, just... sharing an opinion.
I am again biased, with a large holding in WGX, versus RMS (though that could change if RMS somehow snaps up SPR).
Good luck with your investing.
(20min delay)