Vancouver Stock Exchange Seine River fares well

Both the Vancouver Stock Exchange’s Composite and Resource indexes fared poorly over the week ended July 10, falling 9.18 and 13.43 points respectively. The composite index ended at 789.90 while the resource index finished the period at 828.30. Gold’s performance was no help to the indexes as its bounce to the US$362 level a week ago proved short-lived, the yellow metal retreating back to the US$350 level.

Seine River Resources ignored the trend, putting in a very impressive performance as it jumped $1.14 per share to finish the period ended July 10 at $2.04. The company announced that it has placed a US$500,000 deposit on a US$5- million acquisition deal currently being negotiated on a gold property in northern California. The company is also planning to begin operations shortly at its underground placer gold mine in California.

NDU Resources also moved nicely during the period, finishing at $2.10 for an increase of 55 cents per share. Work on the company’s Yukon properties is rumored to be going well, particularly on the Blende property in which Billiton Metals Canada is earning a 50% interest.

The long-awaited release of assay results from drilling on the Star property did not seem to help partners Kokanee Resources and Barkhor Resources. Barkhor was trading at about $1.59 after the release for a loss of 23 cents over the period while Kokanee remained unchanged at the $4.40 level. The results included a vein intercept of 16.4 ft. grading 0.57 oz. silver per ton, 2.3% lead, and 0.62% zinc. In addition, the drilling encountered a stratiform zone of 13.1 ft. grading 3.2 oz. silver per ton, 12.25% lead, and 0.66% zinc.

Waterford Resources leapt 85 cents finishing at $3.35. The company is thought to be linked to overstaking in and around the Eskay Creek property. The announcement by Lytton Resources that it had agreed to acquire up to 50% of private company Tagish Resources boosted the issue from the 20 cents level to a high of 52 cents before it pulled back to 42 cents. Tagish is the company which did the overstaking in the Eskay Creek area.

Adrian Resources, which owns some of the claims subject to the overstaking remained unchanged, trading at the $8 3/8 level. Drilling is continuing on their property at the northern border of the Eskay Creek property with the first hole reported to have intersected mineralization similar to that intersected by Prime and Stikine.

Market action on Prime Resources was quiet over the period ended July 11 as the media circus over insider trading charges against the company’s principals including Murray Pezim got rolling. The issue finished the period at $8.25 for a gain of 1/8.

Eurus Resources was the volume leader for the period trading more than 3.1 million shares to close down 14 cents at $2.90.