The Hottest Commodity of 2025 So Far Is…Platinum! Here’s why and which stocks will benefit

Did you know that the best performing metal in 2025 is not gold, but it is platinum. Let’s take a look at why it is, and how investors can gain exposure to it.

Platinum performing better than gold

Platinum has gained over 30% this year, ahead of gold’s 26% gain. Much of this occurred in the past fortnight when it reached over US$1,200/oz. This is the highest level the metal has been in 4 years.

For investors who were unaware, platinum is a precious metal too, used in many similar instances gold is, including jewellery and coins. But there is one unique use. Namely for vehicles catalytic converters. These essentially ‘detoxify’ emissions from vehicles.

Why is platinum better than gold in 2025?

Obviously the demand for the aforementioned uses, and because demand exceeds supply. The World Platinum Investment Council (WPIC) believes the deficit will be nearly 1 million ounces. Moreover, 2025 will be the third straight year of deficit and at least another 2 will follow.

But perhaps also because investors are looking for an alternative for gold. But the saga with Trump’s tariffs is having an impact too. Metal dealers bought platinum in bulk, even before Liberation Day, fearing the metal would be subject to tariffs. The irony is that the very same platinum is now moving back out.

Most important of all, from the perspective of investors, is that there are so few companies with exposure to this metal compared to gold. Nonetheless, some companies are exposed.

Which stocks?

While Australia has very few deposits, one example is the Gonneville/Julimar deposit which is owned by Chalice Mining (ASX:CHN).

According to the most recent Resource – outlined in July 2023, it has a resource of 560Mt @ 0.54% nickel or ~1.7g/t palladium equivalent. 55% of this is Measured and Indicated with the balance Inferred. This equates to 16Moz of 3E (Palladium, Platinum and Gold combined), 860kt nickel, 520kt copper and 83kt of cobalt.

Investors re-rated the company from under $40m to over $1.5bn in under 2 years, but shares retreated to a market cap of $500m. All because Gonneville could cost $1.6-2.3bn to turn into an operating mine, and an FID is still another year away. There are other concerns about the project such as local NIMBYs although the cost and timeline are the biggest concerns.

Turning to pureplays, one is Zimplats (ASX:ZIM) which is a $1.8bn miner that has seen its shares gain 28% in 2025. It has mining operations in the southern African country of Zimbabwe. Zimplats is at a pivotal point, developing a new mine (Mupani) to fully replace 2 existing operating mines. It produced 645,911/oz in FY24. While its profit was only US$8.2m in that year, this may well change in FY25 if these prices hold.

Southern Palladium (ASX:SPD) is another with a project in South Africa. a PFS depicted a Maiden Ore Reserve of 6.29Moz of 6E (including platinum as well as palladium, rhodium, ruthenium, iridium and others). This would deliver an NPV of US$1bn and an IRR of 28%.

The company exploited the commodity price spike to raise $8m in capital last week to accelerate a planned DFS. A few weeks earlier, the company received environmental authorisation.

Conclusion

Platinum has turned out to be the hottest commodity of 2025 – even better than gold. But this did not happen by accident. It has been happening because of a widening supply deficit, strong demand for the metal and concerns over Trump’s tariffs and what they’d mean for the commodity.

Unlike gold, there are far fewer companies in this space (at least as pureplays) and it may be tempting to buy stocks as a ‘knee-jerk’ reaction. In our view, it’d be one thing to buy an ETF with broad exposure to platinum, but another to just buy one or two companies thinking they’ll go up just because platinum may continue to. We think the latter strategy is too risky, but the former is less risky and one that investors may potentially consider.

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