Year-to-date gain: 120 percent; current share price: C$0.55

Garibaldi Resources is an explorer focused on its high-grade Nickel Mountain project in BC, Canada. According to the company, it discovered Northwest BC’s first magmatic nickel massive sulfide, which is within the E&L intrusion at Nickel Mountain. The discovery contains seven metals, including nickel, copper and cobalt. Exploration highlights include 8.3 percent nickel, 4.3 percent copper and 0.19 percent cobalt over 16.75 meters.

Garibaldi released results from a 2021 ZTEM survey at Nickel Mountain on March 31. According to the release, “the large ZTEM response beneath E&L greatly expands the potential for further discovery beneath and around E&L.” In the week following this news, the company’s share price rocketed, peaking at a year-to-date high of C$0.63 on April 4. Since then, the company has released follow-up information about the ZTEM results, including the identification of a new pipe-like target.

Year-to-date gain: 97.53 percent; current share price: C$0.80

Sherritt International is a miner, producer and refiner of high-purity nickel and cobalt, and its primary focus is nickel. The company operates a mine in Cuba, and a refinery in Alberta, both of which are part of its 50/50 Moa joint venture with Cuba’s General Nickel Company. The vertically integrated joint venture has a capacity of 35,000 tonnes of nickel and 3,800 tonnes of cobalt produced per year.

In February, Sherritt released its 2021 production results and 2022 guidance. Among other details, the company revealed it expects a production increase for nickel, from 31,184 tonnes in 2021 to guidance of 32,000 to 34,000 tonnes for this year. On March 1, the company announced the appointment of decarbonization expert Chih-Ting Lo to its board of directors, and also named Maryse Bélanger as deputy chair. The focus of these changes is to strengthen Sherritt's commitment to environmental, social and governance matters.

The company’s share price shot up alongside the nickel price to reach a high of C$0.82 on March 10.

Year-to-date gain: 90.48 percent; current share price: C$0.20

Grid Metals is a nickel exploration and development company working out of Canada’s Manitoba and Ontario provinces. The company holds a portfolio of five projects that all tie into its goal to target the battery metals industry. Grid’s flagship project is its Makwa Mayville nickel-copper project, which also hosts platinum-group metals and cobalt mineralization. Near Makwa Mayville is Grid’s Mayville lithium property. The company is also exploring the Donner Lake lithium project.

On February 23, Grid Metals provided updates on its nickel and lithium properties, including the drilling of an initial 10 holes at its Makwa Mayville project. Later, on March 11, the company released drill results from its Bannockburn nickel property. The best result was 341.7 meters averaging 0.28 percent nickel. The company’s share price also rose with nickel to hit a high of C$0.23 on March 10. Since then, the company has released exploration results for two drill holes at Donner Lake and 14 at Makwa Mayville.

Year-to-date gain: 74.23 percent; current share price: C$1.69

Unlike the other companies on this list, Nickel 28 Capital is a streaming and royalty company focused on battery metals, primarily nickel and cobalt. The company has an 8.56 percent joint venture interest in the Ramu nickel-cobalt operation in Papua New Guinea, as well as royalty agreements for 13 nickel and cobalt projects.

The company’s only news in 2022 came on February 1, when it shared full-year and Q4 2021 operating results for the Ramu project, including annual production of 31,594 MT of contained nickel and sales of 32,793 MT. Although Nickel 28 has seen limited news recently, its share price has trended upwards throughout the year, with a spike in early March and steady growth throughout April.

Year-to-date gain: 60 percent; current share price: C$0.80

FPX Nickel is a nickel company developing its flagship Decar Nickel District in BC, at which its main focus is the Baptiste deposit. It has recently begun exploring the Van deposit at the same property. It also has 100 percent ownership of three other nickel projects in BC and one in Canada's Yukon.

The company saw its share price leap in early January after it released final results from a maiden drill program at the Van target. According to the company, “The results of the first seven holes at Van ... have exceeded our expectations and confirmed Van as a major new discovery for the nickel industry.” On February 1, FPX shared that it was commencing a scoping study to discover whether the high-grade nickel from Baptiste would be able to become nickel sulfate for the electric vehicle battery supply chain. Shares stayed elevated through the month.

FPX’s share price soared in early March alongside the nickel price and on the release of news that the company had appointed a new principal metallurgist; the company hit a year-to-date high of C$0.87 on March 8. Other March news includes drill results at Baptiste and the creation of a subsidiary called CO2 Lock to pursue carbon capture technology. Most recently, the company added Anne Currie to its board of directors.