The Barrick Breakout: Gold’s Surge and a Corporate Shakeup Rewrite the Story
Barrick’s comeback has stunned Bay Street as activist pressure, leadership upheaval, and gold’s runaway rally collide to create a rare opportunity for investors.
Barrick Mining (NYSE: B | TSX: ABX) has long been one of those names investors love to debate. The gold giant is a staple in Canadian markets, yet for years it has carried the reputation of a chronic laggard. Even as gold entered multiple bull cycles, Barrick consistently seemed to move with all the urgency of a glacier. But 2025 has shattered that narrative in spectacular fashion. A flurry of executive shakeups, the involvement of a heavyweight activist investor, a sweeping operational review that could carve the company in two, and headlines involving a nine-figure government payment in West Africa have pushed the stock into the spotlight unlike any time in the last decade.
The shock isn’t just the drama. It’s the stock price. Barrick’s Toronto-listed shares are up more than 150 percent year-to-date, propelled by gold’s incredible run in 2025. What’s even more surprising is that some of Canada’s most disciplined money managers are calling the stock a buy again, something many of them openly admit they never expected to say.
A Breakout Fifteen Years in the Making
Colin Cieszynski, chief market strategist at SIA Wealth Management in Calgary, doesn’t mince words. Barrick has spent years disappointing investors, trailing even the most modestly run gold producers. Yet his team watched the stock break decisively above a key resistance level in September, a technical move Wall Street loves because it often signals a major shift in sentiment.
His reaction was disbelief. Inside the firm’s investment committee meeting, the comment landed with the weight of an inside joke becoming reality. For the first time in what felt like forever, Barrick was flashing buy signals not seen in at least fifteen years. The market wasn’t just bidding up gold. It was bidding up Barrick itself.
That, in the mining world, is a plot twist.

