Franco-Nevada Corp.
Overview
Franco-Nevada Corp. is a senior gold royalty and streaming company headquartered in Toronto, Canada, operating primarily in Canada and South America. Key assets include Antapaccay, Candelaria, Goldstrike, Permian Basin, and Vale Iron Ore Systems. The company's portfolio includes 118 producing assets, 38 advanced-stage assets, and 276 exploration-stage assets. As a gold-focused royalty and streaming entity, the business model is designed to provide investors with yield and exposure to commodity price and exploration optionality while limiting exposure to cost inflation and other operating risks. Revenue is generated from various agreements, including net smelter return royalties, streams, and net profit interests. The organization does not operate mines, develop projects, or conduct exploration. This structure creates a free cash flow-generating business with limited future capital commitments, allowing management to focus on managing and growing its portfolio of interests. The majority of its interests are structured such that payments are based on production levels with no adjustments for the operator’s costs, insulating margins from operating cost inflation. The diversified portfolio of cash-flow producing assets is managed by a small, specialized team.
Strategy
The strategic approach centers on combining lower-risk investments with a strong balance sheet, progressively growing dividends, and maintaining exposure to exploration optionality. A core objective is the creation of long-term partnerships with operators, leveraging the flexibility of royalty and stream financing. The enterprise maintains a long-term investment outlook, recognizing the cyclical nature of the resource sector, and positions itself to provide capital when it is otherwise scarce. Investment focus is on creating exposure to precious metal resource optionality, which includes direct investments in primary mines and providing capital to other mines to secure by-product production. The strategy also involves investing in other metals and energy to provide shareholders with additional resource optionality. Growth is pursued through a disciplined acquisition process and supplemented by the organic development of assets within the existing portfolio as they advance from exploration to production.
Management
Executive leadership is headed by President & Chief Executive Officer Paul Brink, who has been with the organization since its 2007 IPO and previously led its business development activities. The board is chaired by David Harquail, the founding CEO. The Board of Directors is composed of 10 members, with a majority being independent. Board oversight is structured through key committees, including an Audit and Risk Committee composed entirely of independent directors and a Compensation and ESG Committee. The governance framework is supported by a comprehensive set of corporate policies, including a code of business conduct, a whistleblower policy, and specific procedures for managing potential conflicts of interest among directors and officers. For instance, directors with a potential conflict must disclose it and abstain from voting on the related matter. The Audit and Risk Committee charter outlines direct responsibility for overseeing the independent auditor, financial reporting integrity, and risk management processes, including technology and climate-related risks.
Sustainability
The organization's approach to sustainability is guided by an Investment Principles (Environmental, Social and Governance) policy, which influences investment decisions and the ongoing management of its assets. The company actively supports industry-wide initiatives, including the World Gold Council’s Responsible Gold Mining Principles and responsible exploration initiatives with the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada. A comprehensive suite of internal policies underpins its commitments, covering human rights, diversity and inclusion, health and safety, and a supplier code of conduct. As part of its investment process, the entity may directly contribute to local initiatives, such as a 2024 commitment to provide $750,000 over a 3-year period for environmental and social programs related to a specific project financing. The Audit and Risk Committee's mandate includes oversight of climate and technology-related risks, ensuring these factors are integrated into the corporate risk management framework.
Structure
The corporate structure is actively managed through strategic partnerships, acquisitions, and equity investments. A key structural element is a joint acquisition arrangement established in 2023 with EMX Royalty Corporation for newly created royalties, where funding is contributed 55% by the company and 45% by EMX, with resulting interests split equally. Another strategic relationship involves a jointly-owned entity, the Royalty Acquisition Venture, with Continental Resources, Inc., formed to acquire royalty rights. The company also participates in multi-party financing packages, such as the 2024 stream financing with Osisko Gold Royalties Ltd., where the two entities participated on a 70%/30% basis. Recent transactions include the 2024 acquisition of a royalty from Compañía de Minas Buenaventura S.A.A. and a 2025 financing package with Discovery Silver Corp., which is expected to result in the company holding an approximate 9.9% equity ownership in Discovery. The organization maintains operational subsidiaries to manage its portfolio and pursue new investments.
Source
Franco-nevada Corporation - Asset Handbook - 2025
- Project should be interpreted as a single, group or complex of mines, deposits or other mineral assets. Name of the project should be identical to the official company naming convention.
- The ranges of values provided are indicative and should not be regarded as exact figures.
- Figures for exploration and development projects are based on available data and are indicative only; actual values may vary substantially.
- Royalties frequently apply to specific mineralized areas that may not coincide exactly with the boundaries of the overall project. As a result, even if a mine is currently in operation, the portion subject to the royalty may not be included in extraction activities until future years.
- Commodities are listed from most dominant to least dominant. Only selected commodities are shown.
- Table might not include all projects that are currently owned by the company. Displayed data are snapshots of the company's projects in time and might not be up to date.
- Exploration projects are partially represented in the table. Only projects with mineralization or strategic importance are shown.
- Companies might own processing facilities that are not included in the table. Those facilities play important role especially for companies operating in uranium, nickel and lithium sectors.
- Chart is always based on the company's primary listing.
- Presented values are denominated in currency of the country where the company is headquartered. Values like market capitalization might differ from the values visible in other parts of the page, where the currency is always USD.
- koz au: Thousand ounces of gold (production volume)
- moz au: Million ounces of gold (resource base or production volume)
- g/t: Grams per tonne (grade of gold or silver in ore)
- usd/oz au: US dollars per ounce of gold (cost metric)
- moz ag: Million ounces of silver (resource base or production volume)
- g/t ag: Grams per tonne of silver in ore (grade)
- usd/oz ag: US dollars per ounce of silver (cost metric)
- kt cu: Thousand tonnes of copper (production volume)
- mt ore: Million tonnes of ore (resource base for copper)
- %: Percent copper or uranium in ore (grade)
- usd/lb cu: US dollars per pound of copper (cost metric)
- mlb U3O8: Million pounds of uranium oxide (U3O8) (production or resource base)
- % eU3O8: Percent equivalent uranium oxide in ore (grade)
- usd/lb u3o8: US dollars per pound of uranium oxide (cost metric)
- Open Pit: Surface mining method using large excavated terraces to extract ore
- Underground: Subsurface mining through shafts, tunnels, and chambers
- ISR (In-Situ Recovery): Solution mining method using chemical leaching without excavation
- Exploration: Early-stage project searching for and defining mineral deposits
- Development: Mine under construction or preparation for production
- Operating: Active mine currently extracting and processing ore
- Expansion: Mine temporarily suspended or with limited production, in progress to increase production in the future
- Reclamation: Mine permanently closed or no longer producing, but the site is being rehabilitated
- P&P (Proven and Probable Reserves): Highest confidence mineral resources with detailed mine plans, it's a subset of M&I
- M&I (Measured and Indicated Resources): Well-defined resources with good geological confidence
- Inf (Inferred Resources): Estimated resources with limited geological confidence
- Scoping Study: High-level assessment to determine if a project warrants further investigation
- PEA (Preliminary Economic Assessment): Initial economic evaluation of a mineral project
- Pre-Feasibility (Preliminary Feasibility Study): Intermediate-level technical and economic assessment
- Feasibility (Definitive Feasibility Study): Comprehensive technical and economic evaluation for investment decisions
- BFS (Bankable Feasibility Study): Detailed study meeting lender requirements for project financing
- NPV (Net Present Value): Discounted value of future cash flows minus initial investment
- IRR (Internal Rate of Return): Discount rate that makes NPV equal to zero
- Payback Period: Time required to recover initial capital investment from project cash flows
- AISC (All-In Sustaining Cost): Total cost per ounce including sustaining capital and corporate costs
- Royalty: Payment to landowner/government based on percentage of production value or revenue
- Stream: Agreement to purchase future production at predetermined price, often below market rate
- NSR (Net Smelter Return): Royalty based on net revenue after smelting and refining costs
- GRR (Gross Revenue Royalty): Royalty based on total gross revenue before any deductions
- NPI (Net Profits Interest): Royalty based on net profits after operating costs and capital recovery