New year, new Runners.
Yet as we turn the page into 2026 with pledges of self-improvement, weight loss or something else forgotten by February, inevitably some things never seem to change.
ASX Runners are one such staple and these days demand for those commodities that feed the new economy another.
Copper, the red metal d’jour was one of the stars of the show in 2025 with supply concerns driving prices to fresh highs mid-year before a spectacular 25 per cent pull-back in July after the Trump Administration announced it would be exempt from pending tariffs. But those supply concerns remained a force and by end of the year copper prices were back flirting with new highs again.
The precious metal safe-haven darlings of gold and silver also posted breathtaking returns in 2025 which not even a post Chrissie sell-off could dent.
Official forecasts for the financial year peg Australian gold to export a remarkable $60 billion worth of the yellow metal. That’s enough to vault it into second place on our national export leaderboard - trailing only iron ore and comfortably overtaking liquefied natural gas.
But the real star was silver. Once commonly referred to as the poor man’s gold, silver prices clipped US$84 an ounce in the final days of December – about 190 per cent up. A 10 per cent correction in the final few trading hours of the year barely registered on the charts.
For Australian investors nursing only a modest ASX gain last year, these shining commodities and all things AI remain the bright spots to watch.
The calendar hadn’t even flipped and the old favourites were already making headlines, as global mining heavyweight BHP backed a A$1.69 billion Chinese takeover of SolGold by Jiangxi Copper, ending a decade-long fight for the Cascabel copper-gold project in Ecuador.
BHP, Newmont, and other major shareholders have agreed to sell their stakes if the bid is formalised.
On a short trading week with many of the market pundits still nursing silly-season hangovers there are only a few ASX darlings to grace our Runners cavalcade.
True to form, we began the new year exactly as we ended with a plucky junior gold explorer storming to the top of the leaderboard. Not far behind, an unlikely lithium developer poked its head above the parapet with a closing surge, while a heavyweight silver player also caught the wind, riding the white metal’s relentless momentum.
CHARGER METALS NL (ASX: CHR)
Up 105% (7.8c – 16c)
The Bulls N’ Bears Runner of the Week is junior goldie Charger Metals, which made a late year charge to take out our top spot with a stonking discovery hit on Tuesday at hits aptly named Xmas Gold Discovery at its Mt Gordon tenure in Western Australia.
Mt Gordon falls within the company’s broader Lake Johnston lithium and gold project in WA’s Yilgarn province and the discovery was the catalyst for a 105 per cent surge on the week.
Four-metre composite samples from a recent reverse circulation (RC) hole delivered a standout 12 metre hit at a ripping 6.55 grams per tonne (g/t) gold from 132m downhole, including a richer 4m slice at 16.9 g/t from 132m and a bonus 8m at 1.57 g/t from 148m. Crucially, this was the first ever drill test of a previously untouched area on the Mt Gordon tenement, piercing mafic-hosted mineralisation beneath a sprawling 1.8km by 1.7km soil anomaly laced with five untested gravity and magnetic targets.
The company’s underexplored anomaly has seen zero historical RC or diamond drilling within 1600m of the discovery hole, instantly upgrading the prospectivity of four additional gravity-magnetic bulls-eyes screaming further discovery.
Multi-element analysis points to a classic mafic-hosted gold deposit, opening what could be a fresh growth avenue for Charger alongside its existing lithium ambitions at Lake Johnston.
Further assays are pending from the recent 1,980m RC program, but the market didn't wait - shares rocketed 105 per cent on explosive volume, peaking at 16c from last year's 7.8c close.
With an expanded RC and diamond campaign firing up in January - fully funded and managed under Rio Tinto Exploration's farm-in agreement - this significant shallow discovery could ignite a bumper start to the year for the junior.
CALIX LIMITED LTD (ASX: CXL)
Up 65% (73c – 120.5c)
Snatching a well-earned silver this week is environmental tech disruptor Calix Limited, surging on a potent cocktail of late-2025 milestones that have punters piling in despite zero fresh news this week.
The company's shares blasted through $1 in the final fortnight of last year, catapulting from 73c on Christmas Eve to an intraday peak of $1.20 by week's end - prompting an inevitable please-explain from the ASX overseers querying the ferocious volume and price spike from December 29.
Calix swiftly responded saying it had no insight into the move, just continued execution on blockbuster goals including the recent completion of its landmark lithium mid-stream demonstration plant in late December - jointly with lithium giant PLS Group at the Pilgangoora operation in WA - plus a fresh three-year US contract for magnesium hydroxide water treatment products worth $10 million per annum.
At its core, Calix is tackling global industrial decarbonisation head-on with its patented Calix Flash Calciner platform, delivering indirect electric heating of minerals to electrify high-temperature processes, capture CO₂ efficiently and produce reactive nanoporous materials for hard-to-abate sectors like cement, lime, iron/steel, alumina and critical minerals.
The price movement and trading on this short week alone saw more than $10 million in shares trade, smashing prior volume records as mystery buyers drove the price up 65 per cent to a high of 120.5c.
With the demo plant now physically complete and commissioning looming, plus recurring US revenue flowing, Calix has morphed from speculative green-tech hopeful to genuine commercial contender.
If the Pilgangoora calciner proves the low-carbon lithium thesis at scale -and early signs scream yes - this could mark the inflection from years of R&D grind to serious revenue ramp.
INVESTIGATOR SILVER LTD (ASX: IVR)
Up 50 % (11c – 16.5c)
Rounding out our Runners for the New Year is another company with no news on the week but by its name is understandably on the push higher. Following a definitive feasibility study (DFS) update in December Investigator Silver has also been on a Chrissie road north.
The company dropped an update for its ongoing DFS at its Paris silver project in South Australia suggesting significantly expanded pit designs in the crazy new price environment and improved recoveries by whopping 6 per cent.
The 6 per cent lift in silver recovery comes on a experimental finer primary grind to 53 microns in the dominant ore type.
The revised pit shells are set incorporating today's sky-high silver prices - assumed at A$70/oz, but with spot now trading almost of A$110/oz., that lower economic cut-off grade has been slashed from 43.5g/t to around 27g/t, boosting contained silver inside the optimised pit by a hefty 13 million ounces. The strip ratio has also been cut from 8.4:1 to a far friendlier 4.2:1.
Paris stands as one of the ASX's rare true pure-play silver stories, boasting leverage galore to the metal's record rampage.
A 2021 PFS already projected a punchy 54 per cent investment rate of return for the project at silver prices half today's levels; with recoveries up, inventories bloated and mineable ounces expanded, the pending full DFS - slated for the front half of this year - could deliver eye-watering economics.
Concurrent work highlights further upside: potential to convert mineralised waste to ore via even modest price or recovery gains, further trimming cut-off and strip.
Shares ripped 50 per cent in an otherwise quiet week to a high of 16.5c from a close last week of 11c on nearly $30 million traded, vaulting the market cap past $300 million in one of the thinnest trading periods of the year.
With the DFS advancing to detailed scheduling, process design and finance-ready costing, Investigator appears to be laser-focused on translating these technical wins into a staged, bankable development plan.
In a market understandably craving for pure silver exposure amid industrial deficits and safe-haven flows, Paris' leverage to prices well north of A$100/oz positions it as a standout re-rating candidate as the study crystallises.
Is your ASX-listed company doing something interesting? Contact: matt.birney@businessnews.com.au
By Andrew Todd
