Zijin Mining (2899.HK): 3Q26 NP up 26% YoY, down 4% QoQ, Weaker Gold Segment Offset by Strong Copper Contribution, Maintain Buy

Citi maintains Buy on Zijin Mining (2899.HK) with a target price of HK$60.50, implying 105.4% expected share price return from HK$29.46. Zijin's 9M26 net income totaled Rmb57.5bn, +52% YoY, representing 71%/70% of Bloomberg consensus/Citi full-year estimates, and recurring net profit totaled Rmb55.8bn, +64% YoY. 3Q26 net profit was Rmb18.4bn, +26% YoY and -4% QoQ, slightly lower than Citi's estimate mainly due to higher cost and lower sales volume of mined gold/copper/lithium amid less attributable profit from associates than expected. Excluding one-offs (mainly a non-recurring fair value gain of Rmb550mn related to equity and fund investments), 3Q26 recurring net profit is Rmb17.8bn, +42% YoY and -9% QoQ. 3Q26 gross profit was Rmb32.5bn, +54% YoY and -5% QoQ, with the copper segment's GP contribution exceeding that of gold. Mined gold output in 3Q26 was 23.4t (-1% YoY, +1% QoQ) with ASP of Rmb868/g and unit GP of Rmb555/t, +14% YoY but -14% QoQ;