Trading Summary (August 07, 2001)

Gains in the utilities and pipelines subindexes led the Toronto Stock Exchange higher on Tuesday. After opening more than 50 points lower in the morning, the TSE’s 300 composite index rose steadily through the day to end at 7,772.2, up 27.99 points from Friday’s closing.The golds climbed 45.85 points, or more than 1%, while the base metal issues shed 37.94 points.

Sister metals platinum and palladium both fell US$25 per oz. in New York. Platinum hit an 18-month low of US$436 per oz. and palladium hit US$435 per oz. Silver fell slightly and gold was unchanged at US$267.50 per oz. The base metals were lower nearly across the board. Aluminum alloy was the lone gainer.

Barrick Gold led Canada’s gold miners with more than 1.2 million shares on the go. The stock gained 53 to end at $22.74. Placer Dome rose 21 to $15.50 on just less than 700,000 shares. Reuters reported that Venezuela’s Corporacion Venezolana de Guayana (CVG) has rejected Placer’s sale of its 70% interest in the Las Cristinas gold mine to Vanessa Ventures. CVG says Placer did not have its written approval for the sale.

"We are going to revoke Placer Dome’s contract at Las Cristinas mine," says Francisco Rangel, CVG’s president. "However, that takes 90 days to do and Placer Dome has 90 days to correct all the errors it has made in fulfilling its contract or it will be revoked."

Other gold miners on the rise were Normandy Mining, 50 higher at $9.50, Glamis Gold, up 13 to $4.48, and Meridian Mining, up 20 to $13.50. On the flip-side, bigger loser were Cambior, off 7, or 11.3%, to 55, Hope Bay Gold, down 2, or 6%, to 31, Wheaton River Minerals, off a nickel, or 6.8%, to 69 and TVX gold, down 3 to 65.

Teck’s B series were the busiest among the base metal miners with more than 1.2 million crossing the floor. The stock shed a dime to $11.55. Most of the others followed suit. Sticking out were Falconbridge, up 28 to $16.90, Noranda, a penny higher at$15.98, and restructuring Boliden, which gained half a penny to 31.

Coming off the holiday weekend, Canada’s junior exchange traded flat on low volume. The Canadian Venture Exchange ended the day virtually unchanged, losing 1.47 points to finish the day at 3,098.27. The Mining Index managed to tack on 3.41 points to close at 7,465.87.

Poplar Resources continued to attract investor interest, climbing to a new 52-week high of 27, up 3 on 618,500 shares. The junior recently announced a $1-million financing aimed at advancing its Bottenbacken palladium-copper project and Sundsvall diamond property, both of which are in Sweden.

Leader Mining International gave back most of last week’s gains, plunging 13 to 84 on 291,750 shares. Stock in the junior moved higher following the recent announcement that money is in place to move forward on the Cogburn nickel property in B.C.

A nice percentage gainer, Gulf International Minerals tacked on 9 to 44 on 121,000 shares. The company is attempting to re-commission the Aprelevka gold mine in Tajikistan.

Radius Explorations lost 3 to end the day at 97 on 91,500 shares. The Simon Ridgway-led junior is drilling the Tambor gold project in Guatemala. The first four holes cut broad low-grade mineralization at the Lupita target.