Best Mining shares for UK investors

Over the last 1, 3 and 6 months, mining ETFs and value ETFs have been performing well.

GIGB (acc) looks very good to me, or if you have a GIA account, then you maye prefer DMAD (dist.) although the fund size of DMAD seems very small it seems to have performed very well. Distributing mining ETFs seems to be quite rare.

MSCI Core World  HMWS is included in the chart above as a benchmark index.

I really like GIGB acc. at the moment and am looking to buy them inside my ISA within the current market dip. For my Invest GIA account, I already hold Fresnillo (FRES) as well as Harmony Gold (HMY), L&G Gold Mining (AUCP acc.) and Lundin Gold (LUG).

These stocks are not my 'hold forever' type holdings as gold, silver and copper may peak in 2026/27 when I will hopefully sell them for a profit.

FTSE Miners

Gold, copper, aluminium (bauxite) and silver were all very good in 2025 and should continue into 2026. Some large FTSE miners are listed below.

I have invested in Fresnillo already. Coeur mining also have done well and I also like Antofagasta for copper. Here is a 6m chart with a few of these companies:

Small, non-diversified mining companies tend to be very risky because of geographical/governmental instability concerns. Large, well-diversified companies with mines in stable countries such as Canada, USA, Australia, etc. are preferable.

World markets are volatile this week due to USA data expected this week.

Tip

Rivian Automotive (RIVN) have now made their own chips and no longer rely on buying in expensive nVidia chips. They also have developed their own software for advanced vehicle control and autonomous driving. They will sell solutions to other car manufacturers for a lot less than other solutions and end users can purchase s/w upgrades via a subscription model or one-off fee.

This new solution means that it will reduce car makers costs (e.g. VW) whilst providing a profit both on h/w and s/w sales and later on from monthly autonomous driving subscriptions/sales. 

I have not managed to find out who makes the ARM-based chips for Rivian, but it may well be Samsung and TSMC.

30% of the Korean ETF (CSKR) is Samsung and it gained 50% this year - I already hold this ETF in my portfolio.

Level 4 hands-off autonomous vehicles are expected in late 2026 and the cost will be significantly cheaper than Tesla's package (1/2 to 1/4 of the price). Rivian will also include radar/lidar support (similar to Google/Waymo) rather than just rely on optical cameras like Tesla do (which have problems with the dark, fog, mist, heavy rain, unrecognised objects in the road, etc.). I know which system I would rather trust!