Mineral Resources is set to release its full-year FY26 results before the market opens today, with the share price having built some meaningful momentum leading in. MinRes shares (ASX: MIN) are up 24.93% over the past month of trading, although there remain questions to be answered.
The company has spent much of the past year telling investors it has turned a corner, pointing to record volumes across mining services, iron ore and lithium, a refinancing that trimmed annual interest costs, and a net debt pile that has begun to shrink. Today will be the moment those claims meet the scrutiny of a full-year profit and loss statement.
Net debt still sits above four billion, commodity prices remain volatile, and a recent earnings print delivered a negative surprise that sent the stock down sharply on the day. So what can we expect this time around?
What To Expect
Expectations are for revenue of 1.77 billion dollars for the period, with an EPS estimate of around $1.96.
Onslow Iron will be the most closely watched single line item. The project shipped 19.7 million wet metric tonnes on an attributable basis in FY26, above guidance, and delivered FOB costs of around US$52 per wet metric tonne, comfortably below the guided range of US$54 to US$59. Investors will want to know whether those cost gains are structural or whether they reflect favourable timing, and how the project’s margins translate into cash flow now that ramp-up is largely behind it.
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Lithium is the other major swing factor. Realised spodumene prices rose 15 per cent quarter on quarter in the June period to around US$2,425 per dry metric tonne on a CIF SC6 basis, capping a sharp recovery from the lows of the prior cycle. Record sales volumes at Wodgina and Mt Marion, combined with the restart of Bald Hill operations in May, mean MinRes carries more lithium exposure into this result than at any point in recent memory. FY27 pricing commentary will be scrutinised closely, given that the sustainability of the rebound remains an open debate across the sector.
Mining services delivered volumes of 341 million tonnes for the year, well above an upgraded guidance range of 320 to 330 million tonnes, and year-on-year growth of roughly 22 per cent. The Street will want to see whether pricing and contract terms are keeping pace with cost inflation, particularly diesel, or whether volume growth is masking margin pressure.
On the balance sheet, net debt is estimated to have declined to around 4.3 billion dollars at 30 June, with liquidity of approximately 2.4 billion dollars. The April refinancing of US$1.3 billion in senior unsecured notes extended maturities and cut annual finance costs by roughly 48 million Australian dollars, a meaningful improvement. Investors will also need to separate statutory profit from underlying earnings, because MinRes has flagged non-recurring items in the second half including revaluation gains on US dollar bonds and fair value movements on listed investments. The underlying free cash flow number is likely to carry more weight than the headline statutory figure.
Price Targets
