Highly-regarded independent analyst, Michael Churchill, of Churchill Research, opined today on the dreadful performance of the mining stocks.  He lamented the negative year-to-date performance of the gold stocks and pondered what was driving the weak relative performance.

He cited rising political risk “all over the map” as one reason of their poor performance, commenting that “a high percentage of people in all countries are effectively becoming poorer due to rising prices for basic goods. What is a Third-World government to do in this situation? The tried and true answer is to take money from the people who have it and give it to the people who don’t. And that’s what we’re seeing.”

The research piece also noted that “Tax selling could also be weighing on the sector as “Friday was April 15 and this is the first year since 2008 that mining investors will have any taxable capital gains to speak of. As a group, mining stocks didn’t get over their previous high water marks until last fall, so there would have been minimal tax selling in April, 2010.”

Churchill highlighted silver explorers as being particularly cheap, citing the fact that “Most silver explorers trade for less than $1.50 per eventual ounce in the ground — even though the economics of their projects make sense at acquisition prices up to $7/oz.”

At the end of the day, Churchill is optimistic on the prospects for the sector, stating that “Only in the last two weeks has gold started to move again. So, if history holds true, gold stocks should start to perform better in coming weeks and months.”