Junior exchange loses ground as bullion slips

Vancouver — Canada’s junior exchange ended the trading week in the red as a lower bullion price took its toll on speculative gold issues. The S&P-TSX Venture Exchange composite index lost 3.25 points, or 0.2% of value, to close at 1,631.13 at the end of the Nov. 19-25 period.

International Wayside Gold Mines tacked on 8 to finish at 22 with more than 11 million shares traded. The Frank Callaghan-led junior announced a $2-million financing consisting of 13.5 million units priced at 15 each. A unit holds one flow-through share and half a non-flow-through warrant. A full warrant allows the holder to buy another share at 25 for 18 months. The funds are earmarked for exploration and development of the Cariboo gold project, near Wells, B.C.

ECU Silver closed at 24, up 2, with 8.3 million shares changing hands. The company holds several silver properties in Mexico.

American Bonanza Gold Mines closed at 43, up a penny, with 6.1 million shares traded. The company is in the midst of underground drilling at its Copperstone gold project in Arizona. Work is also under way on the junior’s Gold Bar property, in Nevada’s Battle Mountain-Eureka mineral belt.

Cabo Mining finished the week at 10, up 4, on a volume of 5.7 million shares. The junior holds the Cobalt property, 10 km southeast of Cobalt, Ont.

Pan-Asia Mining closed at 17, up 6, with 5.7 million shares exchanged. The company has a controlling interest in a Sino-foreign joint-venture company in China’s Shandong province. The jointly owned company owns and operates the 701 Changma diamond mine

Tournagin Gold closed at 50, up 14, on a volume of 3.4 million shares. The company kicked off a scoping study at its wholly owned Kremnica project in the Slovak Republic. In addition, the junior has begun exploring in the Kremnica South area, 5 km south of the Kremnica mine.

Bralorne Pioneer Gold Mines ended the week at 80, up 16, with 3.3 million shares crossing the floor. The company owns the past-producing Bralorne Pioneer mine, 160 km north of Vancouver, and is building a mill to process development stockpiles at the daily rate of 150 tons. Inferred resources above the 800 level of the mine weigh in at 450,000 tons averaging 0.31 oz. gold per ton.

Eurasia Gold closed at 11, up 4 with 3.2 million shares traded. The company operates two gold mines in Kazakhstan through wholly owned subsidiary Andas-Altyn.

Taseko Mines lost 4 and closed at $1.11 with 3.2 million shares traded. The Hunter Dickinson-led company holds the past-producing Gibraltar copper-gold property in British Columbia. The company has been examining the potential for producing copper cathode from concentrates using an innovative hydrometallurgical process developed by Cominco Engineering Services (CESL), a division of Teck Cominco. In August, 2000, a scoping study concluded that the proposed refinery would reduce copper production costs by 22% by eliminating the cost of transporting concentrate to offshore processing locations. Mine start-up and refinery construction costs are pegged at $120 million.

Pacific Comox Resources closed up 7, to 19 as the company released good grab sample assay results from its wholly owned 191-ha Famosa property in Mexico’s Sonora state.