Uzbekistan Gold Record Swells Navoi's Budget as Uranium Equities Retreat
Navoi's $2.64 billion tax payment, nearly 12 percent of Uzbekistan's national revenue, reflects how far gold near $4,000 has shifted Central Asian state finances.
Uzbekistan's state mining giant paid $2.64 billion in taxes in 2025, nearly double its prior-year bill and equivalent to almost 12 percent of the country's $22.3 billion total tax take, according to Navoi Mining and Metallurgical Co.'s year-end financial statements cited by oilprice.com on Thursday (2026-07-24). The payment comes as Uzbekistan's total exports hit an all-time high of $33 billion last year, with gold accounting for roughly $9.9 billion of that, or about 30 percent.4
COMEX gold futures were last at $4,055.93 per ounce as of Friday (2026-07-25). At those prices, Navoi — described by oilprice.com as one of the largest gold producers in the world — has become the dominant revenue driver in the Uzbek state budget. In the country's small-scale mining communities north of villages like Soykechar, men have been tracking gold's movements on phone apps, with local television stations broadcasting the price as it shifts, the oilprice.com report noted.4
The windfall has spread across the region's sovereign balance sheets. Kyrgyzstan holds roughly 75 percent of its reserves in gold, and those reserves rose from $5.1 billion at end-2024 to $8.6 billion last year, oilprice.com reported. That concentration runs both ways: the same allocation that produced these gains leaves both governments acutely exposed to any reversal in gold.4
Uranium equity markets have not tracked gold's trajectory. The URA uranium ETF fell 1.6 percent to $39.89 on Friday (2026-07-25), even as gold held near recent highs. The selloff comes despite bullish signals on both the demand and supply sides of the nuclear fuel market.
Goldman Sachs, in a nuclear tracker report published in May 2026 (2026-05-19), expanded its model to include roughly 46 gigawatts of small modular reactor deployments by 2045, adding 62 million pounds to its long-term uranium demand estimate — a 17 percent increase from its prior forecast. Goldman noted at the time that uranium spot prices were holding in the mid-to-high $80s per pound with term contract pricing near $90 per pound, though those figures are now two months old.1
US domestic supply has staged a sharper-than-expected recovery. The Energy Information Administration, in a report issued during the week of 2026-06-22, said US uranium oxide output more than tripled in 2025 to 2.1 million pounds, a 223 percent increase from 2024 and the highest domestic production since 2016, when US sites mined 2.5 million pounds. Total industry expenditures reached $234.7 million, up 47 percent from 2024 and the largest annual spend since 2014. Exploration drilling jumped nearly 66 percent to just over 1 million feet across 1,824 holes.2
The recovery carries a significant constraint. US annual production capacity actually declined 5 percent in 2025 to 13.3 million pounds U3O8, the EIA said, with five in-situ recovery plants sitting on standby at year-end carrying a combined 8.8 million pounds of dormant output potential. The gap between what the US industry produced last year and what it could produce is a buffer the market cannot ignore.2
New demand-side relationships are forming. During the week of 2026-07-06, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi signed an agreement opening the door to Australian uranium exports to India, the Spectator Australia reported. For Australian producers, each export contract supports jobs and regional investment; for India, the deal reflects a continuation of nuclear expansion that adds to the long-term demand picture Goldman's model is projecting.3
UK carbon allowances were last at £58.80 per tonne of CO2 as of Friday (2026-07-25). That price level keeps nuclear generation cost-competitive with gas-fired alternatives in Britain's power market, where planned reactor capacity additions will eventually require long-term uranium supply commitments.
The most immediate variable is whether those five standby US ISR plants move back into active production. Goldman's SMR-driven demand additions and the US production recovery both argue for higher spot prices, while 8.8 million pounds of idle ISR capacity runs in the other direction. Until that capacity is formally retired or brought back online, every bullish catalyst in the nuclear fuel market has to clear that latent supply buffer first.2,1