Trading Summary (October 24, 2001)

The Toronto Stock Exchange‘s Pipelines, Paper & Forest and Utilities subgroups all dropped more than 1% on Wednesday. By day’s end the TSE 300 composite index was 7.34 points lower at 6,896.9 points with eight of fourteen subindices in the red. The golds, up 37.8 points and base metal issues, up 14.89 points, were not in that number.

All of the precious metals suffered losses in New York. Palladium slipped US$7 to US$315 per oz., sister metal platinum shed US$6 to US$416 per oz. Gold dropped US20 to US$275 per oz. and silver slid 2 pennies to US$4.19. Nickel sunk US$205 to US$4,430 per tonne on the London Metal Exchange, the rest of the base metals traded sideways.

Placer Dome took top spot among mining issues with more than1.6 million shares on the go. The stock fell 20 to $16.65. Pioneer Metals surged more than 81% or 6.5 to 14.5 on about 1.3 million shares. The Vancouver-based uranium explorer announced plans on Wednesday to form a new company, UEX, aimed at exploring for uranium in the Athabasca region of Saskatchewan. Its partner in the endeavour is Cameco, the world’s largest uranium supplier. For its part, Cameco gained 47 to $36.87.

Most of the country’s other gold majors lost ground on Wednesday. Barrick was an exception gaining 35 to $24.65. Normandy Mining added 11 to hit $10.11and Meridian Gold rose 75 to $15.

Earlier this week, Meridian posted net income of US$10.1 million, or 14 per share, virtually unchanged from the year-ago period. Gold production of 110,000 ounces at a record low cash cost of $78 per ounce was an 8% improvement over cash costs in the third quarter last year.The company realized an average gold price of US$282 per oz. for its production, up from US$278 a year earlier.

The base metal miners were mixed. Teck Cominco led the way with more than 1.2 million shares traded. The issue lost a nickel to $10. On Wednesday, the company posted a third-quarter loss of $105 million, or 62 per share. The loss is mostly owing to a $169-million ($122 million after-tax) writedown attributed to asset re-valuation.

Also on the slide were nickel miners Inco, off 4 to $22.66, and Noranda, 23 lower at $14.10.

On Tuesday, Inco posted third-quarter profits of US$33 million on revenue of US$434 million, compared with earnings of US$62 million on revenues of US$642 million a year earlier. Noranda recorded a third-quarter loss of $60 million, down from year-ago earnings of $52 million. Revenue between the two periods slid to $1.46 billion from $1.66 billion.

Modest gains were put in by; Falconbridge, up 20 to $14.80; Sherritt International, up 14 to $4.18; and Alcan, 21 higher at $51.50.

Canada’s junior exchange managed to post a modest rally with junior explorers leading the way. The Canadian Venture Exchange ended the day up 6.53 points, or 0.2% to finish the day at 2,938.19. The Mining Index surged 44.57 points, or 0.6%, to close at 7,427.06.

Samex Mining topped the most actively traded chart among junior explorers ending the day up 1 at 12 on 983,000 shares. Assay results from the first few holes of a planned 600-metre drill program over the Eskapa copper-gold property in Bolivia are expected shortly.

Sultan Minerals fell victim to profit taking ahead of a planned analyst tour to its Kena gold property near Nelson, BC. Stock in the company dropped 7 to close at 43 on 127,500 shares. The junior is currently drilling the Gold Mountain zone on the property. The latest hole returned 172.1 grams gold over a 2-metre interval.

Starfield Resources continued to move higher on strong volume. Investors appear to be speculating that the company will find further indications of the high-grade, platinum-palladium zone cut in hole 101, which returned 103 grams palladium and 27 grams platinum over 0.35 metre. Shares in the junior climbed 6 to 54 on a volume of 297,200 shares.

Chilean Gold ended the day up 7 to 50 on 535,000 shares. In June the company picked up a 100% interest in the Las Hadas property in Chile for $1.