Juniors flat as gold holds above US$450

Precious metals, for the most part, traded in a narrow range over the trading period Dec.1-7. which saw a bit of weakness return to the junior mining sector. The TSX venture exchange index closed at 1712.19, down 37.2 points, or 2% lower from the beginning of the period.

Gold closed at US$453 per oz. on the New York spot market, up marginally from where it started (US$451). The weak U.S. dollar, now at an all-time low against the euro, is largely to blame for gold’s current high price. But market-watchers believe resistance to a weakening dollar may lead to downward pressure on the price of the yellow metal. However, such pressure will likely be offset by safe-haven seekers in the face of renewed terrorism threats, owing to several recent incidents in Europe and Saudi Arabia.

Silver followed gold higher to close at US$7.90 per oz., up 2.5% from the previous trading session, and reached the US$8-per-oz. mark.

In other precious metals, platinum climbed $6, to US$876 per oz., whereas palladium was pretty flat, up a dollar from the previous week to close at US$210 per oz.

Among base metals, nickel lost 56 to close at US$5.87 per lb., while copper shed 8 to finish at US$1.39 per lb. Lead and zinc were trading at 44 and 53 per lb., respectively.

There were only 21 new 52-week highs for venture exchange-listed companies, compared with 74 that reached 52-week lows.

Volume leaders for the trading period were topped by Bell Coast Capital, which traded nearly 5.7 million shares. The company is still riding high on its acquisition of half of a uranium project in Wyoming. Bell Coast’s shares were up 3.5 to close at 34.5, building on the previous week’s whopping 77% gain.

Gold City Industries traded nearly 5.3 million shares, its shares steady over the period to close at 21. The company’s proposed merger with San Gold Resources is expected to be completed during the first quarter of 2005. Meanwhile the Rice Lake joint venture is working toward getting the Bissett mine back into production and extending the property’s resources in the Rice Lake greenstone belt.

APAC Minerals was up 7.5 to close at 51 on a volume of 4.2 million shares. APAC recently initiated an environment baseline study on its 70%-owned Nibao South gold discovery in China’s Guizhou province. The company is also active on its Beyinhar gold deposit in Inner Mongolia, where drilling has outlined what appears to be a continuous zone of gold mineralization. The zone measures at least 150 metres in strike and is greater than 10 metres wide and at least 75 metres deep.

Topping the list of biggest percentage gainers was Copper Ridge Explorations, which gained 63.1% over the period on 1.2 million shares to close at 15.5. The company has several exploration projects under way.

Among the losers was Emgold Mining, which shed 34.6% of its share value to close at 49 — a new 52-week low. Investors seemed to lose interest after an independent preliminary assessment pegged the capital cost for a proposed ceramics plant at US$361 million. The plant is necessary to turn the tailings from Emgold’s yet-to-be-permitted Idaho-Maryland underground gold mine in California into high-temperature ceramic tiles.