Trading Summary (December 10, 2003)

The Toronto Stock Exchange’s gold index dropped another 13.9 points, or 6%, to 217.91 on Wednesday, as the yellow metal shed US$1.30 per oz. to US$406.30 per oz. in New York. The diversified miners chipped in a 7.71-point, or 3.6%, loss to 204.48. A 0.15-point gain by the consumers staples index wasn’t nearly enough to stanch the flow of red ink, with the composite index ending off 88.82 point at 7,887.12 points.

McWatters Mining ended the day as the most traded mining stock, with 15.4 million shares ending unchanged at 4. On Tuesday, Richmont Mines agreed to acquire McWatters’ advanced East Amphi gold property and nearby Fourax property, situated near Malartic in northwestern Quebec, for $7 million in cash. McWatters will complete a $6-million exploration program for Richmont by the end of next year.

The Sudbury joint venture partners headed in opposite directions after exercising options on five properties formerly owned by Inco. FNX Mining gained a nickel to $8.60, while Dynatec fell 3 to $1.40. For their part, Inco shares lost $2.47 to $46.30.

Among the big losers were Gitennes Exploration, off 18% at 55, Wallbridge Mining, down 14% to 86, and Pacific Rim Mining, down about the same to $1.85. Golden Star Resources, Orezone Resources, and Iamgold all fell about 11%, finishing at $8.35, 95, and $9, respectively.

Inmet Mining stood out from the pack of base metal miners grabbing a nickel to make $14.50.

Canada’s junior exchange lost ground for the third straight day as investors elected to unload speculative gold issues. The S&P-TSX Venture Exchange composite index lost 54.31 points, or 3.2%, and closed at 1,643.95 on a volume of 79 million shares.

Vedron Gold and partner Northcott Gold have intersected gold in a drilling campaign on their Davidson Tisdale property in Timmins Ontario. Hole 310-03 cut 3.4 metres averaging 341.1 grams per tonne including a 1.2-metre section averaging 962.4 grams gold. Hole 312-03 cut half a metre averaging 29.9 grams gold and included a 1.0 metre section grading 104.47 grams gold. Vedron stands to earn a 50% interest in the property by spending $5 million on exploration and development over 5 years. The balance of drill results from the current 8 hole drill program are expected in early January. Vedron closed up a penny to 36 with 1.3 million shares traded while Northcott finished the day at 37, up 19 with 473,000 shares traded.

International Wayside Gold Mines lost 2.5 and closed at 22.5 with 1.15 million shares changing hands. The company recently announced that a brokered private placement with First Associates Investments has been increased from 26.7 million units up to 32 million units at the price of $0.15 per unit. Each unit consists of one flow-through common share and one-half of one non-flow-through common share purchase warrant. Each whole warrant entitles the holder to purchase one non-flow-through common share of the company at the price of $0.25 per share for a period of 18 months from the closing of the offering. Proceeds from this offering of up to $4.8 million will be used by the company for continuing exploration and development of its Cariboo gold project at Wells, British Columbia.

American Bonanza Gold Mining lost 1.5 and closed at 37.5 with 1.13 million shares traded. The company is in the midst of underground drilling at its Copperstone gold project in Arizona. Recent results include a 32 ft. interval averaging 23 grams gold, including a 12-ft. interval that averaged 43 grams gold. Exploration is also under way at the junior’s gold Bar property in Nevada’s Battle Mountain-Eureka mineral belt.