Buzz in Vancouver

The 2026 conference season is now in full swing, and I spent the last week of January in Vancouver attending AME Roundup, my first time back in nearly a decade.

There was a tangible buzz around the city throughout the week, and it was hard to ignore the sense that the junior mining sector is moving into another bull market cycle.

Before Roundup officially began, the week started with the IMDEX Xploration Symposium, a one day workshop focused on exploration innovation. It was encouraging to see technologies moving beyond pilots and beginning to deliver real impact within organisations. The bigger challenge now is adoption, embedding these tools into established workflows requires a cultural shift and can disrupt long standing ways of working.

The week also included the Vancouver Resource Investor Conference (VRIC), which was free to attend and very busy. The presence of retail investors and the overall energy provided a clear signal that financing in gold is booming.

AME Roundup itself opened with a packed exhibition hall and a strong mix of service companies, junior explorers, and major mining groups. The technical talks were, as always, of exceptionally high standard, and it was particularly fascinating to hear the latest updates from British Columbia and the Yukon, especially given my own earlier work on Yukon gold systems during my PhD.

With gold surpassing $5,000 USD during the week, the buzz was hard to miss. While prices slid back shortly after, the broader signals remain clear.

At the same time, it is increasingly obvious that the context the sector operates within is shifting rapidly. Geopolitics, trade routes, and critical mineral strategy are reshaping how mining is viewed, and how projects are prioritised. Development timelines in mining are measured in decades, while policy, technology, and capital cycles move in years.

Overall, Vancouver reinforced both the optimism in the current market environment and the importance of disciplined, systems level thinking as the industry navigates a changing global landscape.

Dr. Matthew Grimshaw