Trading Summary (February 20, 2003)

The Toronto Stock Exchange moved up slightly on Thursday with comparatively little movement in any of the market sectors. The TSX Composite market index closed at 6,566.11, up 6.43 points, or a mere tenth of a percent. Another measure of the directionless day was that eight of the sectoral indexes, including the miners, moved up, while five, including the golds, moved down.

It was a generally positive day on the bullion market, with gold fixed at US$351.55 in the London afternoon session, but the TSX Gold index was off 1.16 points to 185.88. The fall masked a trading day where most of the golds moved higher, but index heavyweight Placer Dome lost big. Placer fell 85 to $15.54 after announcing slightly lower fourth-quarter earnings and led the golds in volume, with 4.3 million shares changing hands.

The other two issues that fell back were Barrick Gold, which was down 2 at $24.36, and Goldcorp, which slid 14 to $18. Elsewhere there were some solid gains, none more so than a 60 advance by Agnico Eagle Mines, which closed at $21.20 on a volume of 1.6 million shares. Agnico announced after the Wednesday close that its production and profit were both up in 2002.

The TSX Diversified Metals and Mining index was 1.06 points higher at 131.96, with some strong advances offsetting wider declines. Coal miner Fording got the green light from the courts after yesterday’s shareholder vote to approve its business combination with the coking-coal operations of Sherritt International and Teck Cominco. Fording was off 24 at $33.15, Teck B shares fell 20 to $11.80, and Sherritt, which also announced further restructuring of debt at its Sherritt Power subsidiary, gained 16 to finish at $4.75.

LionOre Mining was up 22 at $5.50, although there has been no further news about a re-start of production at the BCL smelter in Botswana, the principal customer for LionOre’s nickel concentrates.

Among the juniors, Northern Orion Exploration was the volume leader, with 5.3 million shares moving. It rose 1.5 to close at 16. Birim Goldfields, which announced the government of Ghana had given regulatory approval for mining in lands set aside for lumber operations, was down 2 at 35.5; Birim’s Mampon gold deposit has been awaiting this approval for several years.

Canada’s junior exchange ended the day virtually flat with investors electing to stay on the side lines. The S&P-TSX Venture Exchange composite index gained 0.33 of a point and closed at 1,095.03.

Spider Resources aded a penny to close at 6 on 722,000 shares. The company holds diamond properties in the James Bay Lowlands in northern Ontario and the Wawa project in central Ontario with joint venture partner KWG Resources. In Brazil, Spider is also a partner in the Alto Paranaiba project in the states of Goais and Minas Gerais.

Investors tooks some profits in Stornoway Ventures. Shares of the junior lost 8 to close at $1.27 on a volume of 779,700. Stock in Stronoway and partner Northern Empire Minerals have traded heavily since announcing the discoery of two diamond-bearing kimberlites on the Melville Peninsula in Nunavut. The partners recently picked up more ground in the vicinity of their Aviat project located 850 km northwest of the territorial capital of Iqaluit. Shares in Northern Empire dropped 13 to $1.22 on a volume of 586,300.

Moving to a new 52-week high, Wolfden Resources added 2 to close at $2.07 on 603,200 shares. Earlier this month the company launched a drill program on the East Bay gold property in Ontario’s Red Lake gold belt.