Trading Summary (June 06, 2001)

The Toronto Stock Exchange slipped 64.42 points on Monday to end at 8,194.4. The metals and mineral subindex led the slide, falling 100.7 points, or more than 2%. The golds didn’t fare much better, losing 94.45 points, or just under 2%. Overall, only five of the TSE’s 14 subindexes managed to keep their heads above water.

The base metal miners suffered a bit of a selloff. Teck fell 80 to $16.15, Cominco dropped $1.45 to $34.70 and Sherritt International lost 40 to $5.49. All three took spots on the TSE’s most active issue list with more than 2 million shares on the go. Teck saw nearly 3.6 million shares change hands. The refrain was the same nearly across the board. Two exceptions were Noranda, which gained 18 to $17.05, and Boliden, which rose 3 to $78. Noranda and affiliate Falconbridge recently filed a lawsuit in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice against Swedish-Canadian miner Boliden regarding Boliden’s refusal to complete the sale of two projects in Chile.

The red ink flowed freely among the country’s gold miners as well. Barrick Gold was the most active, falling 36 to $24.89 on more than 1.6 million shares. Placer Dome shed 55 to $16.15 on about 1 million shares. Normandy Mining, up 12 to $8.65, and Hope Bay Gold, a penny higher at 39, were bright spots in the group.

Wheaton River Minerals lost a nickel to 81. The government of Costa Rica has granted free zone status to the company’s wholly owned subsidiary, Metales Procesados, which owns and operates the Bellavista open-pit, heap-leach gold mine in Costa Rica. Wheaton is waiting for higher gold prices to further develop the project.

On the diamond watch, Mountain Province Diamonds shot up 18, or 17%, to $1.23. The company has announced that exploration drilling by De Beers Canada Exploration has uncovered a series of near-surface, sub-parallel kimberlite sills in the MZ Lake area of the AK property in the Northwest Territories.

The Canadian Venture Exchange posted gains on all fronts. The composite index added 8.61 points, or 0.3% to its value and closed the day at 3363.28. The mining index jumped 19.19 points, or 0.3%, and finished at 7247.38.

Bralorne Pioneer Gold Mines jumped 2 and closed the day at 17 with 1.5 million shares traded. The company, with its joint venture partner, Avino Silver and Gold Mines, plans to develop and re-open the Bralorne-Pioneer gold mine in the town of Bralorne, BC.

Primo Resources found a nickel and closed at 23 on 1.1 million shares. The company is focused on the acquisition, exploration and development of promising mineral and oil & gas properties. Its current areas of concentration include gold exploration in Argentina and oil & gas properties in the United States. The two mineral properties in Argentina are located in the provinces of San Luis and La Rioja, in northwestern Argentina. They cover approximately 40,000 ha and are host to gold vein systems.

New Blue Ribbon Resources closed at 12 down 2 on 490,000 shares. The issue was hit hard last week after assay results from the first round of drilling on the Moose diamond property in Manitoba dudded. Blue Ribbon’s joint-venture partner, BHP Diamonds, tested seven magnetic anomalies on the project without hitting kimberlite.

Radius Explorations closed at 95, up 2 with 459,000 shares crossing the floor. The company recently announced that a wholly owned subsidiary of Gold Fields agreed to purchase, by way of a non-brokered private placement 1,904,762 units of Radius at a price of $1.05 per unit, for proceeds of $2.0 million. Proceeds from this financing will be used primarily to fund exploration work on the company’s Guatemala projects along the Motagua gold belt.

Rockwell Ventures closed up 4 to 44 on 231,000 shares. The company reports that it has been assigned a private company from Hunter Dickinson’s stable which has an option to earn a 60% interest in the 314-ha Fox River property situated 250 km east of Thompson Manitoba. To earn the interest Rockwell will have to spend $12.5 million over five years. The property is believed to host excellent potential for nickel-copper-pgm and diamond deposits.