Barrick Gold (NYSE:GOLD) held its fourth-quarter earnings conference call on Wednesday. Below is the complete transcript from the call.
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Summary
Barrick Gold reported a near doubling of quarterly revenues to $5 billion, driven by acquisitions and higher average selling prices, resulting in a 35% increase in gross profit.
The company highlighted successful strategic partnerships, notably with Tether, contributing to increased demand and profitability in their secured lending segment.
Operational highlights included the acquisition of Sunshine Mint, enhancing production capacity and positioning Barrick Gold to meet growing demand from sovereign mints.
Despite a slowdown in demand beginning mid-March, Barrick Gold continues to focus on leveraging strategic investments and exploring new distribution channels in numismatics and collectibles.
The company announced a special dividend of $1 per share, reflecting confidence in future growth and a commitment to shareholder returns.
Full Transcript
Matthew, Operator
Good afternoon and welcome to Barrick Gold's conference call for the fiscal fourth quarter ended June 30, 2026. My name is Matthew, and I'll be your operator. This afternoon, before this call, Barrick Gold issued its results for the fiscal fourth quarter and full year 2026 in a press release, which is available in the Investor Relations section of the company's website at www.gold.com. You can find the link in the Investor Relations section at the top of the home page.
Joining us for today's call are Barrick Gold CEO Greg Roberts, President Thor Gjerdrum, and CFO Kerry Dickson. Following their remarks, we'll open the call for your questions. Then, before we conclude the call, I'll provide the necessary cautions regarding the forward-looking statements made by management during this call. I'd like to remind everyone that this call is being recorded and will be made available for replay via a link available in the Investor Relations section of Barrick Gold's website.
Now I'd like to turn the call over to Barrick Gold CEO, Mr. Greg Roberts. Sir, please proceed.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Thank you, Matthew, and good afternoon to everyone. Thank you for joining our call today. Our fourth quarter results reflect our strategic execution and further demonstrate our strong value proposition as we continue leveraging the breadth of our capabilities across our fully integrated platform. Our results are reflective of the economic and geopolitical environment after precious metal prices retreated from the historical high levels we experienced in Q3.
Revenues for our quarter nearly doubled to $5 billion compared to the prior year, driven in part by acquisitions, and we are pleased to deliver a 35% increase in gross profit along with net income of $12 million and earnings per diluted share of $0.41. In our direct-to-consumer segment, the increase in revenues was driven by higher average order values as well as our acquisition of Monax in January. We continue to be encouraged by the performance of Monx since the acquisition.
JM Bullion continues to perform well, and we are also seeing meaningful productivity improvements from key technology initiatives around AI as well as increasing mobile adoption. Growth in the wholesale sales and ancillary services segment was broad-based across businesses and geographies, reflecting continued interest in precious metals and an expanding customer base. Our strategic partnership with Tether, now several months into execution, continues to translate into tangible results across the business.
We are seeing increased demand for secured lending driven by our marketing efforts and expanded interest by owners in borrowing against their bullion and collectible portfolios. Our secured lending segment delivered improved profitability in the current quarter compared to the prior year. The growth in our storage and secured lending business enables us to forge deeper, more durable relationships with our customers and drive incremental business across the most complete vertical stack in the industry.
As we continue to leverage the strategic investments we've made to build a vertically integrated model spanning the entire precious metals ecosystem, we are seeing an expanding set of opportunities with major retailers and institutional customers as well as new potential channels of distribution in numismatics and other collectibles. These new channels represent an opportunity to expand our product portfolio into adjacent alternative asset categories where we are seeing significant interest and growth.
Our latest acquisitions are performing well, and we continue to make progress on integration efforts. Our Sunshine Mint transaction we closed in April was a major milestone that significantly expands our total production capacity and creates a clear pathway to capturing additional value and market share globally. With its strong capabilities and capacity, Sunshine Mint is well positioned to serve the growing demand from the United States Mint and other sovereign mints around the world.
In addition, we've significantly expanded our capabilities with state-of-the-art facilities, enhancing Barrick Gold's ability to develop differentiated products for our broader valued customers and our own portfolio of brands. As we continue to grow and scale our combined minting business, we expect to realize meaningful operating synergies. Market conditions remain constructive, underlying trends across our business remain strong, and we are well positioned for broad-based growth and delivering long-term value to our shareholders.
Today we are pleased to announce a special dividend of $1 per share, in addition to maintaining our regular dividend of $0.20 per share. We intend to continue deploying capital efficiently and are excited at what lies ahead for Barrick Gold. With that, I turn the call over to our Chief Financial Officer, Kerry Dickson, who will provide an overview of our financial performance. Then our President, Thor Gjerdrum, will discuss our key operating metrics.
I will then provide further insights into our business and growth strategy, as well as take your questions. Kerry.
Terry
Thank you, Greg, and good afternoon, everyone. Hope everyone's having a great day. Our revenues for fiscal Q4 increased 99% to $5 billion from $2.5 billion in Q4 of last year. Excluding an increase of $0.9 billion of forward sales, our revenues increased $1.6 billion, or 94%, which was due to higher average selling prices of gold and silver as well as an increase in gold ounces sold, partially offset by a decrease in silver ounces sold. Revenues also increased due to the acquisition of Monix in January of 2026 and SMI in April of 2026.
For the full fiscal year, revenues increased 132% to $25.5 billion from $11 billion in fiscal 2025. Excluding an increase of $8.3 billion of forward sales, our revenues increased $6.2 billion, or 95%, due to higher average selling prices of gold and silver as well as an increase in gold ounces sold, partially offset by a decrease in silver ounces sold. Revenue also increased due to the acquisition of SGI, Pinehurst, and AMS in the last two quarters of fiscal 2025, Monix in the third quarter of fiscal 2026, and SMI in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2026.
Gross profit for fiscal Q4 increased 35% to $110.3 million, or 2.2% of revenue, from $81.7 million, or 3.25% of revenue, in Q4 of last year. The increase was due to an increase in gross profits earned by both our Wholesale Sales and Ancillary Services segment and our Direct-to-Consumer segment, including the acquisition of Monix and SMI. For the full fiscal year, gross profit increased 115% to $453.1 million, or 1.78% of revenue, from $210.9 million, or 1.92% of revenue, in fiscal 2025.
The increase was due to an increase in gross profits earned by both our Wholesale Sales and Ancillary Services segment and our Direct-to-Consumer segment, including the acquisition of Monix and SMI, which were not included in the same year-ago period, and SGI, Pinehurst, and AMS, which were only partially included in the same year-ago period. SG&A expenses for fiscal Q4 increased 46% to $77.9 million from $53.4 million in Q4 of last year. The change is primarily due to an increase in compensation expense, including performance-based accruals of $17.1 million, higher advertising costs of $2.2 million, and an increase in insurance costs of $2.7 million. SG&A expenses for Q4 2026 included $8.2 million of expenses incurred by Monix and SMI, which were not included in the same year-ago period. For the full fiscal year, SG&A expenses increased 98% to $275.6 million from $139.2 million in fiscal 2025, primarily due to an increase in compensation expense of $85.8 million, higher advertising cost of $20.4 million, an increase in insurance costs of $8.7 million, and an increase in consulting and professional fees of $7.4 million.
SG&A expenses for the year included $104.3 million of expenses incurred by Monix and SMI, which were not included in the same year-ago period, and SGI, Pinehurst, and AMS were only partially included in the same year-ago period. Depreciation and amortization expense for fiscal Q4 increased 18% to $10.1 million from $8.6 million in Q4 of last year. The change is primarily due to an increase in depreciation expense of $1.2 million and an increase in amortization expense of $1.9 million related to intangible assets acquired through our acquisitions of Monix and SMI, partially offset by a decrease of $1.6 million in SGI, AMS, and SGB intangible asset amortization. For the full fiscal year, depreciation and amortization expense increased 52% to $34.8 million from $22.9 million in fiscal 2025 due to an increase in amortization expense of $11.6 million related to the intangible assets acquired through our acquisitions of SGI, Pinehurst, AMS, Monix, and SMI, and an increase in depreciation expense of $5.8 million, partially offset by a decrease of $5.6 million in JMB and SGB intangible asset amortization.
Interest income for fiscal Q4 increased 40% to $7.5 million from $5.3 million in Q4 of last year. The increase was due to higher interest income earned by our Secured Lending segment of $0.8 million, our Direct-to-Consumer segment of $0.7 million, and our Wholesale Sales and Ancillary Services segment of $0.6 million. For the full fiscal year, interest income decreased 1% to $25.6 million from $25.9 million in fiscal 2025 due to a $2.4 million decrease in interest income earned by our Wholesale Sales and Ancillary Services segment, partially offset by an increase in interest earned by our Secured Lending segment of $1.0 million and an increase in interest earned by our Direct-to-Consumer segment of $1.1 million. Interest expense for fiscal Q4 increased 3% to $13.2 million from $12.9 million in Q4 of last year. The increase is primarily due to a $5.3 million increase related to precious metal leases, a $0.8 million increase related to product financing arrangements, and a $0.7 million increase related to other interest charges, partially offset by a $6.4 million decrease associated with our trading credit facility.
For the full fiscal year, interest expense increased 32% to $61 million from $46.2 million in fiscal 2025, primarily due to an $11 million increase related to precious metal leases and an $8 million increase related to product financing arrangements, partially offset by a $5.4 million decrease associated with our trading credit facility. Earnings from our equity method investments for fiscal Q4 increased 364% to $2 million from a loss of $0.8 million in Q4 of last year.
For the full fiscal year, earnings from equity method investments increased 255% to $4.4 million from a loss of $2.8 million in fiscal 2025. Net income attributable to the company for fiscal Q4 totaled $12.2 million, or $0.41 per diluted share, compared to net income of $10.3 million, or $0.41 per diluted share, in Q4 of last year. For the full fiscal year, net income attributable to the company totaled $82.3 million, or $3.02 per diluted share, compared to $17.3 million, or $0.71 per diluted share, in fiscal 2025.
Adjusted net income before provision for income taxes, a non-GAAP financial measure which excludes depreciation, amortization, acquisition costs, remeasurement gains or losses, and contingent fair value consideration, totaled $24.7 million for fiscal Q4, an increase of 29% compared to $19.2 million in Q4 of last year. For the full fiscal year, adjusted net income totaled $139.9 million, an increase of 164% compared to $53.1 million in fiscal 2025.
EBITDA, a non-GAAP liquidity measure, totaled $28.2 million for fiscal Q4, a decrease of 3% compared to $29.2 million in Q4 of last year. For the full fiscal year, EBITDA totaled $179.8 million, an increase of 179% from $64.4 million in fiscal 2025. Turning to the balance sheet, we maintained a strong liquidity position and ended the quarter with $578 million in cash, compared to $77.7 million at the end of fiscal 2025. Our non-restricted inventories totaled $1.6 billion as of June 30, 2026, compared to $794.8 million at the end of fiscal 2025.
That completes my financial summary. I will now turn the call over to Thor, who will provide an update on our key operating metrics.
Thor Gerdrum
Thank you, Terry. Looking at our key operating metrics for the fiscal fourth quarter and full year 2026, we sold 521,000 ounces in Q4 2026, which is up 51% from Q4 of last year and down 1% from the prior quarter. For the full fiscal year, we sold 2 million ounces of gold, which was up 24% from last fiscal year. We sold 15.3 million ounces of silver in Q4 2026, which was down 2% from Q4 of last year and down 48% from the prior quarter. For the full fiscal year, we sold 73.6 million ounces of silver, which remained relatively unchanged from last fiscal year.
The number of new customers in the DTC segment, which is defined as those who registered, set up a new account, or made a purchase for the first time during the period, was 67,900 in Q4 2026. This was down 38% from Q4 of last year and down 77% from the prior quarter. For the three months ended March 31, 2026, approximately 58% of the new customers were attributable to the acquisition of Monix. For the three months ended June 30, 2025, approximately 30% of the new customers were attributable to the acquisition of AMS.
For the full fiscal year, the number of new customers in the DTC segment was 526,300, which was down 53% from the prior fiscal year. Approximately 33% of the new customers for fiscal year 2026 were attributable to the acquisition of Monix. Approximately 79% of the new customers in fiscal 2025 were attributable to the acquisitions of SGI, Pinehurst, and AMS. The number of total customers in the DTC segment at the end of the fourth quarter was approximately 4.7 million, which is a 13% increase from the prior year.
The year-over-year increase in total customers was due to the acquisition of Monix as well as organic growth of our DTC customer base. Finally, the number of secured loans as of June 30, 2026 totaled 367, a 9% increase from March 31, 2026 and an 18% decrease from June 30, 2025. The dollar value of our loan portfolio at the end of fiscal year 2026 totaled $115.1 million, a 9% decrease from March 31, 2026 and a 22% increase from June 30, 2025. That concludes my prepared remarks.
I now turn it back over to Greg for closing remarks.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Thank you, Thor. Thank you, Carrie. Fiscal 2026 was a transformational year highlighted by continued growth through both organic expansion and strategic acquisitions, our rebranding to Gold.com, and outstanding financial results that underscored the strength of our vertically integrated model. Looking ahead to fiscal 2027, with our expanded brand portfolio and ongoing focus on integration and optimization opportunities, we remain confident in Gold.com's long-term growth strategy and our continuing ability to deliver shareholder value.
Matthew, Operator
Thank you, everyone. At this time, we will be conducting a question-and-answer session. If you have any questions or comments, please press star-one on your phone at this time. We do ask that while posing your question, please pick up your handset if you're listening on speakerphone to provide optimum sound quality. And once again, if you have any questions or comments, please press star-one on your phone. Please hold while we poll for questions.
Thank you. Your first question is coming from Mike Baker from D.A. Davidson. Your line is live.
Mike Baker, Analyst at D.A. Davidson
Great. Thank you. Sorry. Congratulations on a great year. As it relates to this quarter, you said the environment softened a little bit. Can you just describe the environment, I guess, in the June quarter, and if you wouldn't mind, now that we're two months into the September quarter, how things are looking now? One measure is that EBITDA in the June quarter was flat year over year. Yet, at least the way we look at it, we get prices have come down, but spreads have really widened quite a bit versus last year—maybe not where they were in December, but widened versus last year.
So I guess I'm wondering why you wouldn't be more profitable in this June
Greg Roberts, CEO
quarter versus the same quarter last year. Well, actually I think that silver premiums have actually narrowed, so I'm not exactly sure what numbers you're looking at. But definitely in this last quarter we've seen less demand. So even if the premiums are up, if we're selling less ounces, we're going to make less money. So I do think that, you know, it sounds simple to just look at spreads on certain products, but we deal in thousands and thousands of products and premiums are different across all of those products.
So I'm, you know, it's a little broader than that as it relates to the first question. I think we started to see a slowdown mid March to the beginning of April and that continued through Q4 and has continued for the first 22 months of Q1.27. As I've said many times before, this on again, off again war situation is just, you know, it's just not, it's not great for a lot of things, but in particular our customers tend to, I think, sit on their hands a little bit more.
And I've said this before so you know, it is the nature of our business that, you know, everybody by now should know. We can make our entire year in one quarter, which is, you know, we just did that. So when the environment sets up, we're going to take advantage of it and we're going to have an incredible year like we did this year. But that doesn't mean that it's going to be even across four quarters, nor does it mean that each quarter is going to compare positively or negatively to the previous year.
So I think we're in great shape. I think we believe that we're focused on everything that I've talked about in the opening statements and the business is very healthy and we're getting as much out of the environment as we're able to.
Mike Baker, Analyst at D.A. Davidson
Great, fair enough. And if I could ask one follow up, I was intrigued by some of the comments you made about some of the business you're doing with major retailers. Do you mean Costco? If you could update us on that as well as some of the new channels. You're thinking about collectibles, perhaps things along those lines.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yeah, I think the Costco business for us is very good right now and that's spearheaded by Bobby Balandas and our Silver Gold Bull Calgary office. We continue to see good results and I believe that, you know, we're the right customer for the right vendor for Costco. We are able to service them with our mints, our logistics, our trading and, you know, Bobby's doing a great job there. As it relates to some of the other retailers or retail platforms that we're looking at, there are a number of new digital platforms out there that are selling both bullion and collectible products in a little bit different way, a little bit younger demographic.
There's been a bit of gamification to some of the retailers that are selling products that we're supplying and we feel good that this is a social media type. Retail platforms are a great opportunity for us to find new clients and also achieve a younger demographic.
Mike Baker, Analyst at D.A. Davidson
Thank you.
Matthew, Operator
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Thomas Forte from Maxim Group. Your line is live.
Thomas Forte, Analyst at Maxim Group
Great. So congratulations, Greg, Carrie and Thor. I have one question, one follow up. I'll go one at a time. So Greg, it's always fun to ask you questions when I don't know the answer, whereas one has a suspicion. So how should we think about the implications of higher for longer interest rate environment and then the short term impact of rising rates on consumer and investors interest in precious metals?
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yeah, that's a great question. You know, I have never seen, you know, in my 50 years of being in this business, I've never really seen a situation where gold, you know, is behaving much more as an asset class than a hedge. And it's pretty clear right now that higher interest rates are sapping the momentum of gold spot prices as well as silver prices. And gold and silver tend to perform better historically in lower interest rate environments. So as it relates to the spot prices of gold and silver right now, I think they are directly tied to interest rates.
I think the other factor that is pretty apparent to me now is that when the war is on, both gold and silver spot prices decrease and our business tends to flatten a bit. And we just, you know, over the last three or four months we've seen some dips in metal prices which I think are related at least in some part to interest rates. But we haven't seen, you know, a dip buying or dip enthusiasm with our retail customers. Our institutional and wholesale business has been pretty good.
But as everybody knows, that business is a little bit lower margin business. So I, you know, it's. Every day is a new day for us. Once I think there's a trend or there's a way to kind of figure out what's going on, you wake up and something's different or something's changed in the macro environment. And we just adapt to that every hour of every day 24/7. And that's what we do here.
Thomas Forte, Analyst at Maxim Group
Excellent. And then I apologize, my second one's more boring. Can you, since you're paying a one time dividend and congratulations for that, can you give us your high level thoughts on capital allocation including strategic M and A, quarterly dividends, one time dividends and buybacks. I think you did all four this fiscal have to double check the buyback. But I feel like you did everything this year.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yep. Yeah, I mean I think I've said for the last 10 years that when we have a great year, we're going to try to, you know, give back to the shareholders with a special dividend. This year was a perfect example of that. I think, you know, we continue to be committed to our quarterly dividend but when we, when we have exceptional quarters or exceptional years, we will likely, you know, give back a little bit of that. I think as it relates to buybacks, you know, I think with a nearly billion dollar book value in our company, I think I always try to project that I view the business based as a multiple of our book and if the price gives us a chance or an opportunity to buy back at a discount to our book value, we're going to take a long hard look at that. Related to M and A. As many longtime listeners to this conference and shareholders know, we've been very active in M and A and I don't think that's going to slow down. So, you know, the problem with M and A is there has to be a deal, there has to be a price and then, you know, it takes a while to diligence and close a deal. And so, you know, you don't want to.
I try not to fixate on any one of these, the, you know, the different capital allocation silos or pillars that we look at. But I think that what we have found historically is when you have short term slowdowns in the marketplace, which, you know, as you can tell by this quarter, although I thought it was a good quarter, we did slow down a little bit. It does tend to create opportunities in M and A where sellers are maybe a little less enthusiastic about their performance.
So right now is a point in time where I'm working very hard to assess and look at any potential opportunities.
Thomas Forte, Analyst at Maxim Group
Thank you so much, Greg.
Matthew, Operator
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Craig Irwin from Roth Capital. Your line is live.
Andrew Orm, Analyst at Roth Capital (for Craig Irwin)
Hey guys, it's Andrew Orm for Craig. Congrats on the strong year and thanks for taking my questions. First one for me, can you just kind of help us further understand how the Tether partnership contributed in the quarter and maybe, you know, what areas you guys have hit the ground running and you know, what you guys are looking at to further develop over the near term?
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yep. I would say that, you know, Q4 was a little bit of a get to know you digesting period with Tether. And I think that, you know, we have found a very good opportunity that's a win win for both sides where we've been able to help Tether with their storage, their trading. We have a very high amount of, high dollar amount of gold leases and silver leases from them and our storage with them has been very good. And so I think you can see some of that in our top line numbers for the quarter.
You know, the business that we're currently doing with Tether is lower margin, you know, higher, higher volume numbers. And so I don't think, you know, you could say that it, it's going to make or break a quarter right now. I think, you know, we continue, as you can see from our Q3 results, you know, we, we do very well in our DTC businesses and our retail customers are active in buying physical metal. But so far the opportunities and, you know, results that we're seeing with Tether have been particularly exciting and I'm looking forward to the future and I think the sky's the limit as it relates to what we can do with Tether, so continuing to get, you know, to find opportunities where we can bring value to them as well as, you know, they're bringing value to us. But I will say that based on the disclosures and the transaction details that we put out with Tether as it related to the gross position of leases and the size of their storage, we're currently at multiples of the numbers that we put out. So it's certainly moving in the right direction, which is somewhat reflected in our liquidity and our opportunities that are being given to us.
Andrew Orm, Analyst at Roth Capital (for Craig Irwin)
Great. Really appreciate the color there. And second, for me, a little unrelated, now that you guys have SMI as a fully owned asset with them being, you know, a supplier of blanks to the US Mint and other sovereign mints. Is there any way this kind of, you know, deepens the relationship you guys have with the sovereign mints and can kind of, you know, support the business here?
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yeah, I don't see that as, you know, a big change. I think we've been supplying, whether we own 0, 48% or 100% of Sunshine, we've been supplying. Sunshine has been supplying blanks to the Mint for 20 years. So that hasn't really changed. I think that as it relates to the other sovereign mints, certainly at the moment the on again, off again tariffs create some potential opportunities for us with the sovereign mints. But at the moment the tariffs are, you know, are causing headwinds as it relates to sovereign mints selling to us and then having us redistribute in the United States.
I think our Singapore and Hong Kong offices are benefiting from our relationship with the sovereign mints. So I think that's a good thing. But I don't think that our ownership percentage, particularly with Sunshine, it changes anything with the sovereign mints. They are strong relationships that have been there for quite some time.
Andrew Orm, Analyst at Roth Capital (for Craig Irwin)
Understood. Well, thanks for taking my questions and congrats again on the strong year.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Thank you.
Matthew, Operator
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Brian McNamara from Canaccord. Your line is live.
Brian McNamara, Analyst at Canaccord Genuity
Hey, good afternoon, guys. Thanks for taking the questions. Sure. Kind of a follow up here on Tether. I think in May you mentioned that Gold Lease line was higher than you had projected in the release. And then I think you just said earlier in the answer to the couple of questions ago that it was multiples of what was in the release. Can we get any more granular on the sizing of that and kind of where that can potentially get to and kind of is this kind of.
I guess as you mentioned, you know, the first quarter was kind of a feeling out period. Like how long of that time period would you expect that to take? Thanks.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yeah, I think multiples is as far as I want to go right now. But I would say that we are developing and have a good relationship with Tether, and it appears that what we are doing with them so far has been a win-win. Hearing from their side, we're providing some opportunities for them that they aren't able to take advantage of with other trading partners. So I think we are going to continue to look at opportunities with Tether, and I expect us to learn a lot from them, and I expect that they're going to bring their expertise and know-how on some other, particularly digital products, that we might work on.
So like I said earlier, I think the sky's the limit and we're very, very happy with the relationship, we're happy with the investment, and we look to grow the relationship with them.
UNKNOWN, Analyst
And then secondly, numismatics seems like a business that's really seeing robust structural growth. I think Dick's Sporting Goods last week called out its trading cards and collectibles business as being quite strong in an otherwise weak quarter. What are the opportunities there for you guys, both organically and inorganically?
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yeah, I mean I think all the hard asset classes right now are repricing and are seeing growth across all of the hard asset classes. So I think collectibles falls into that. We're having one of our largest auction weeks of the year right now going on with Stacks Bowers and it looks like we're going to sell in excess of $50 million worth of products over the five- to six-day period at Stacks. And the prices thus far over the last two days have been very strong.
So I think that the collectibles market is very robust and I think that particularly in the sports card area that you just mentioned, I do think there's opportunity now. The prices are very, very much up from three or four years ago, so be a little bit cautious there. But our lending business, CFC, does lend on sports cards and we've had a good deal of success getting to know the market through providing liquidity and being a lender, and I think sports cards is an area that we can look to grow in in the future at the Stacks Bowers level.
UNKNOWN, Analyst
Great. I'll pass it on. Thanks a lot.
Matthew, Operator
Thank you. Your next question is coming from Greg Gibas from Northland Securities. Your line is live.
Greg Gibas, Analyst at Northland Securities
Hey, thanks for taking the questions, Greg, and congrats on the strong year. I wanted to maybe just dive a little bit deeper on any shifts within your DTC segment, or in terms of trends you're seeing with consumer buying behavior. And I know you touched on purchasing patterns and those being tied to war-related developments, but perhaps product category preferences or anything you could share there.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yeah, you know, just to start, I mean in our Q3, as I said earlier, our customer base was just going crazy buying product and the premiums were higher and there was—you had $120 silver and you had $5,000-plus gold and it was in the news every day. And I think from my perspective, I was thrilled that we were able to perform and deliver product quickly to customers when they asked for it. And I think our infrastructure and all of our DTC brands outperformed what I would have expected, as well as our distribution business AMGL.
So I think that in that quarter in particular, all of the retail customers across all of our platforms were in buy mode. At the same time they were also in sell mode, which we've talked about before. So longer-term buyers were liquidating some of their material at the higher spot prices. So it was a very good environment for us. I think we continue to see buybacks be a big part of our trading businesses. And older silver products in particular are trading at a discount, which puts a bit of a headwind on newer silver products that we manufacture.
Now we've augmented our production with a number of higher-premium specialty products at our mints. But the higher-margin specialty products just don't sell in the volume as the straight 1 oz silver round or the 1 oz gold bar. So it's a little bit of a mixed bag. But I'm very happy with our retail base. You can probably see from the numbers that our new client acquisition has slowed a little bit over the last quarter, and we're working on new marketing, we're working on new ways to attract new customers, and I think we have some great opportunities and some great initiatives.
But as you'll see if you go back, when we're very busy and the markets are really on fire, we're going to get two or three times as many new customers in a month than we might get in a slower period. So, again, thrilled and excited about how we perform and how we're performing both in a little bit slower quarter in Q4, but more importantly how we're able to really take advantage quickly when the market gives us an opportunity.
Greg Gibas, Analyst at Northland Securities
Got it. That's helpful and unrelated here, but could you maybe remind us of the impact of costs associated with backwardation in the March quarter? I was trying to get a better sense of the uplift you saw in Q4 as it related to those non-normalized headwinds and perhaps just how financing costs trended when taking into account the benefit from savings from Tether on the financing side.
Greg Roberts, CEO
Yeah, we haven't really been able to recognize some of those savings yet. I think that what you can see from our filings is going to be a decrease in our credit facility as it relates to our dollar facility and you're going to see an increase, which we've just talked about, related to our leases that we've disclosed that Tether is booking with us. So the leases are very important as it relates to backwardation and contango. Right now we are back in a contango situation.
The backwardation eased off as the market slowed down and spot prices came down in February—and I'm sorry, in March and April. So our big job right now is—the gold leases for us are great if we have inventory that we need to hedge using the gold leases. If we have excess leases and we don't have inventory to hedge, we're going to pay the lease fee plus we're going to have to pay the contango. So that can be a bit of a headwind. I think our job over the next six to nine months is to make sure we deploy the gold leases that we're getting from Tether and make sure that we're using that liquidity to put it to good use and get a return in excess of what we're paying for the leases. So it's a great opportunity for us. It's cheaper liquidity than our dollar facilities, but I think it's going to take probably a couple of quarters for us to really see those benefits.
Greg Gibas, Analyst at Northland Securities
Okay, thanks very much.
Matthew, Operator
Thank you. At this time, this concludes our question and answer session. I'd now like to turn the call back over to Mr. Roberts for his closing remarks.
Greg Roberts, CEO
I'd like to thank all of our shareholders—we have many new ones and all of our old ones—for joining the call today and for your continued interest and support. All of our employees, I thank them for all they do day in and day out, and we look forward to keeping you updated on our continued progress. Thank you all for joining today.
Matthew, Operator
Thank you. Before we conclude today's call, I'd like to provide Gold.com's safe harbor statement that includes important cautions regarding forward-looking statements made during this call. During today's call, there were forward-looking statements made regarding future events. Statements that relate to Gold.com's future plans, objectives, expectations, performance, events, and the like are forward-looking statements within the meanings of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934.
These include statements regarding expectations with respect to future profitability and growth, internal expansion, operational enhancements, and the amount or timing of any future dividends. Future events, risks, and uncertainties, individually or in the aggregate, could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in these statements. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include the failure to execute the Company's growth strategy, including the inability to identify suitable or available acquisition or investment opportunities, greater-than-anticipated costs incurred during the execution of the strategy, our inability to execute on our cost containment and expense reduction programs, government regulations that might impede growth, particularly in Asia, including with respect to tariff policy, the inability to successfully integrate our recently acquired businesses, changes in the current international political climate, which historically has favorably contributed to the demand and volatility in the precious metals market but has also posed certain risks and uncertainties for the Company, increased competition for the Company's higher-margin services which could depress pricing, the failure of the Company's business model to respond to changes in the market environment as anticipated, changes in consumer demand and preferences for precious metal products generally, potential negative effects that inflationary pressure may have on our business, the failure of our investee companies to maintain or address the preferences of their customer bases, general risks of doing business in the commodity markets, and the strategic, business, economic, financial, political, and governmental risks and other risk factors described in the Company's public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The Company undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements. Listeners are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. Finally, I'd like to remind everyone that a recording of today's call will be available for replay via a link on the Investors section of the Company's website. Thank you for joining us today for Gold.com's earnings call. You may now disconnect.
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