By Genia Turanova, Leeb Income Performance

 

Newmont Mining (NEM) currently sells at its lowest valuation in four years despite the fact that the price of its main product, gold, has nearly doubled since then.

 

Moreover, its valuation is lower than that of the overall market -- and its yield is higher. In fact, it is the highest-yielding stock in the sector, with a yield of 2.8%, significantly above the average for the category.

 

If you want to compare apples to apples, here's the deal:

 

The stock is trading at less than 10 times estimated next year earnings, which is only 10% more expensive than the average valuation for the gold mining sector (which, admittedly, has become very cheap in the past 6-12 months).

 

Its introduction of a gold-linked dividend in April 2011 (each quarter's dividend is indexed to the average price of the gold that Newmont sells in that quarter with additional step-up provisions) was an innovative move that may result in a higher dividend down the road.

 

Founded in 1921, Newmont Mining is the largest U.S.-based gold miner and the only direct gold play that is an S&P 500 component.

 

It's a well-diversified gold producer, with significant assets or operations in the United States, Australia, Peru, Indonesia, Ghana, Canada, New Zealand and Mexico.

 

As of year-end 2011, Newmont had proven and probable reserves of attributable 98.8 million ounces of gold, and its cash cost is $650 per ounce of gold.

 

As for its gold price-linked dividend, for the second quarter of 2012 it was 35 cents per share, based on the average gold price of $1,684 per ounce. This dividend was 75% higher than what Newmont paid a year ago.

 

Longer term, cost controls and production growth are the two necessary conditions needed to maintain and grow the dividend, but we believe, with Newmont's target of 3.2 million ounces of pipeline potential can be sustained and even raised.

 

For industry-beating yields and gold-price leverage, we rate Newmont Mining a "buy."

 

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