Trading Summary (July 11, 2003)

The Toronto Stock Exchange crept up only slightly on Friday, as most worldstock markets had a mildly positive day. The TSX Composite indexadded 6.01 points to finish at 7,077.56, a gain of 0.1% of value.

That wasn’t echoed in the golds or the base metals, with most of theadvance captured by the utilities and consumer-staples sectors. The TSXGold index fell 0.1 point to 167.89, while the TSX Metals andMining index was off 0.28 point to 129.98.

The big retreat on the gold board was by Gabriel Resources, whichwas down 24 at $2.28, a 9.5% decline, on a volume of almost a million and ahalf shares.

Following remarks on Thursday from the Romanian prime minister, AdrianNastase — in which he described his government as “very reluctant” toapprove Gabriel’s Rosia Montana gold development — Gabriel withdrew from a$28-million bought-deal financing. It is instead going ahead with abest-efforts offering the same number of shares — 10 million — but has notspecified a price.

The most actively traded golds were generally lower on the day;Kinross Gold saw 2.7 million shares traded while falling 11 to$8.40, and Eldorado Gold sagged 6 to $2.54 on a volume of 2.6million.

On the upswing were Barrick Gold, Placer Dome, and most ofthe mid-tiers: Barrick edged up 14 to $23.84, Placer scratched out a 6gain to close at $16.37, Agnico Eagle Mines was up 4 at $15.90, andGoldcorp rose 7 to $16.20. Meridian Gold posted the best gainof the day, 45 to $16.58, in thin trading.

Off the gold index, Golden Star Resources, which yesterdayannounced it would bring its Wassa gold deposit in Ghana into production,shed 35 to finish at $3.70, on a volume of 2.4 million shares.

The base metal stocks were all down, with the exception of TeckCominco, whose B shares packed on a quarter to close at $11.41. Theywere also the most active on the board, with just under 800,000 sharesmoving. The company’s second-quarter financials come out on July 23.

The biggest percentage declines were among some of the smaller producers:Ivanhoe Mines slipped 8 to $3.22, Sherritt International fella nickel to $4.55, and LionOre Mining International dropped 7 to$5.45.

A few of the bigger miners also had bad days; Falconbridge was off15 at $17.60, Noranda 7 at $13.28, and Inco 17 at $28.98.There is no sign of talks between Inco and the United Steelworkers — thebargaining unit at the Sudbury operations and the Port Colborne refinery –resuming at any time soon.

Canada’s junior exchange finished the week on an up tick with advancing issues edging out declining issues 316 to 314. The S&P TSX Venture Exchange composite index closed up 4.77 points, or 0.43%, to 1122.86 38.5 million shares traded.

Wolfden Resources jumped 30 to $2.70 with 849,400 shares traded. The company posted initial drill results from the West Zone discovery at its 100% owned High Lake property in Nunavut. The first two holes have intersected up to 6.15% copper, 1.91% zinc, 142.3 grams silver and 3.49 grams gold per tonne. The West Zone discovery was make while following up an airborne anomaly identified from a 2002 regional airborne geophysical survey. Follow-up diamond drilling has intersected semi-massive and massive sulphide mineralization in the West Zone to depths of up to approximately 200 meters, over a strike length of 100 meters, and the deposit remains open along strike to the north and south, and at depth.

Genco Resources closed flat at 90 with 812,000 shares traded. The company recently announced that it posted a net loss of $225,822 for the nine months ended April 30, 2003. The junior attributed the increased expenditures the acquisition of the Temascaltepec Mining District land position as well as La Guitarra Mine from Toronto-listed Wheaton River Minerals.

Rubicon Minerals closed up a penny to 80 with 344,000 shares traded. The company has commenced a phase II, 7,500-ft. drill program at the Rivard gold project located at the west end of the prolific Red Lake gold camp. The Rivard project is part of the Rubicon-AngloGold RLJV properties in Red Lake. Under the terms of the RLJV agreement, AngloGold can earn up to a 70% interest in optioned properties by spending US$3.5 million on or before January 25th, 2005 and by making a cash payment of US$250,000 within 90 days of vesting.