Investor Newsletter, May 2026

Dear Investor,

Colombia is entering the final stages of its presidential election process and investors are asking what the outcome might mean for the mining sector. Political debate is noisy, elections attract headlines and opinions are plentiful. Rather than speculate and contribute to the noise, I thought it more useful to share a few related observations.

The first is that the most important terrain is the human terrain. Projects are not legitimized in presidential palaces, ministries or boardrooms. They are legitimized on the ground. Colombia generates no shortage of political noise, headlines and debate, but our challenge is to maintain stability, opportunity and legitimacy in the communities where we work. We get that right and the rest falls into line.

The second is that institutions outlast governments. One of Colombia's great strengths is that its institutions have proven more durable than its politics. The 1991 Constitution deliberately dispersed power across the state and established strong checks and measures on executive authority. As a direct consequence, Colombia’s Mining Code has remained largely intact for almost twenty-five years, while its royalty framework is progressive, returning a meaningful share of mining revenues to the departments and municipalities that host development.

The National Mining Agency has placed considerable emphasis on mining formalization, including a pilot program in Marmato designed to bring more than 900 ancestral miners into the legal economy. Colombia's mineral resources belong to all Colombians, and formalization is an important step toward improving environmental outcomes and extending economic opportunity across society. We see further evidence of institutional effectiveness in the recent environmental approval of the El Alacrán copper project. We congratulate Royal Road director Sarah Armstrong-Montoya and the team at Cordoba Minerals on this achievement.

None of this is to suggest that Colombia is without challenges. In my view, the country's greatest challenge today is security. Any incoming government would do well to focus its efforts there. Colombia's greatest resource is not gold, copper or coal. It is Colombians themselves. Give Colombians security and opportunity and they will do the rest.

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