Metals & Mining
By SuperdayReps · Wharton MBA · ex-Greenhill · investment banking interview coaching
18 min read · updated October 10, 2026
A metals and mining interview is mostly the standard first round. The three statements, a DCF, terminal value, WACC, enterprise value against equity value, and the valuation methods all still come up, and they are covered in the range of technicals and the lessons under it.
A metals and mining group advises the companies that dig metal out of the ground, the ones that turn it into steel and aluminium, and the ones that finance mines for a share of the output. The processors mostly value like any industrial company. The miners do not, because a mine is a fixed amount of rock that runs out, sold at a price nobody in the room controls.
Two ideas carry most of this sector. A mine is a depleting asset, so it is worth the present value of the metal still in the ground, mined out over a finite life, which is why the anchor is a NAV model with no terminal value. And a miner is a price taker, so what it is worth depends on an assumed price deck, while what keeps it alive when prices fall is where its costs sit against its peers'. Most mining answers come back to one of those two.
The map of the sector
The first question is often "what are the sub-sectors, and do they value differently?" Only some of them do.
| Sub-sector | How it makes money | How it is valued |
|---|---|---|
| Precious metals miners | Mine and sell gold, silver, platinum group metals | NAV and P/NAV first, then price to cash flow and EV / EBITDA |
| Base metals miners | Mine copper, nickel, zinc, sold as concentrate or refined metal | NAV and P/NAV, EV / EBITDA, often a higher discount rate than gold |
| Bulk commodities | Iron ore and coal, shipped in huge volumes at thin unit margins | EV / EBITDA and DCF, NAV at the asset level |
| Diversified majors | Many metals and mines across many countries | Sum of the parts, each piece valued on its own metal's basis |
| Processors | Buy ore, scrap or alumina; sell steel, aluminium, alloys | Like any manufacturer: DCF, EV / EBITDA, P / E |
| Royalty and streaming | Paid a share of another company's revenue or metal | P/NAV and price to cash flow, usually at a premium |
| Developers and explorers | Nothing yet; own a deposit and a plan | Risked NAV of the project, and value per ounce or tonne in the ground |
The line that matters is between miners and processors. A steel mill owns no ore body. It lives on the gap between what it pays for iron ore, coal or scrap and what it charges for steel, so it gets an ordinary DCF and EV / EBITDA, and the interesting work is in the drivers.
A quick steel example. A producer with 5.0 million tonnes of capacity running at 80 percent utilisation ships 4.0 million tonnes. If it realises $900 a tonne, pays $520 a tonne for raw materials and spends $230 a tonne converting them, it earns $150 a tonne, or $600 million of EBITDA. So revenue is capacity times utilisation times the realised price. Let the spread between the steel price and raw materials narrow by $50 a tonne and EBITDA falls to $400 million, a third lower, with no change in volume. Since both sides of that spread are commodity prices, the base case needs downside and upside cases beside it. The plants also eat capital just to keep running, so two mills on the same EV / EBITDA can be worth quite different amounts; EV / NOPAT charges each for its depreciation and its own tax bill.
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Frequently asked
- What questions do metals and mining investment banking interviews ask?
- The standard first round plus a sector layer. The sector layer is how the sector splits into miners, processors such as steel producers, diversified majors and royalty companies, the difference between reserves and resources, how grade and tonnage turn into ounces and a mine life, what all-in sustaining cost measures, how a commodity price deck works, how a mine-by-mine NAV model is built and compared with the share price, why gold equivalent and copper equivalent figures exist, and how you choose comparable mining companies.
- How do you value a mining company?
- Mainly with a net asset value model: a discounted cash flow for each mine over its remaining life, with no terminal value, run on a price deck and discounted at a rate set by convention for the metal. You add the mines together, subtract the present value of corporate overhead, then bridge from that to equity with cash, debt and closure obligations, and compare the result with the market value as price to NAV. EV / EBITDA, price to cash flow and value per ounce or tonne in the ground sit alongside it.
- What is the difference between reserves and resources in mining?
- A resource is a body of mineral with reasonable prospects of eventually being mined, classed as measured, indicated or inferred by how well it has been drilled. A reserve is the part of the measured and indicated resource that a mine plan and an economic study show can actually be mined at a profit, classed as proven or probable. Inferred resources cannot be counted as reserves. Reserves are the safer basis for a valuation, and anything beyond them should be risked.
- What is all-in sustaining cost?
- A per-ounce measure of what it costs a gold miner to keep producing at its current level: the mine's operating costs, royalties and production taxes, the capital spending needed to sustain the existing mines, corporate overhead, and sustaining exploration and closure costs, less any by-product credits. It leaves out the capital spent on new mines and expansions. The gap between AISC and the gold price is the best quick read of a producer's margin.
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