The S&P/TSX Venture Composite Index eked out a 4.16-point gain over the trading session to close at 695.31. The index has been stuck at late-2008 levels of 700 points and below since November.
Gold and silver were up 3% and 6%, as soft U.S. economic data supported expectations that the Federal Reserve will wait until later in the year to raise interest rates.
Coastal Gold was by far most traded Venture stock, with 14.7 million shares traded. The junior gained 1¢ to 5¢ per share on news that it has accepted a sweetened takeover bid from First Mining Finance Corp. With an implied value of $13.5 million, including the assumption of $2.5 million of Coastal Gold’s costs and debt, the offer trumps a previous offer by Sulliden Mining valued at $4 million.
The deal would see First Mining issue 0.1625 of share for each share of Coastal Gold.
The company, which released a high-grade underground resource for its Hope Brook gold project in Newfoundland in January, will have to pay Sulliden a $250,000 break fee if the First Mining acquisition is consummated.
Hope Brook contains 5.5 million indicated tonnes grading 4.77 grams gold for 844,000 oz. gold, and 836,000 inferred tonnes grading 4.11 grams gold for 110,000 oz.
Top gainer by value Zenyatta Ventures added 33¢ to end at $2.51. The jump followed news on May 9 that the junior graphite company has tested an innovative purification process for ore from its Albany hydrothermal graphite deposit in northern Ontario.
The process, which was designed for the Albany deposit, improved on previous bench-scale testing, with six samples from Albany yielding more than 99.9% purity.
The data will be used for an upcoming preliminary economic assessment.
Pacific Booker Minerals — which owns the long-delayed Morrison Lake copper-gold project, 65 km north of Smithers, B.C. — led the value-lost category, shedding 35¢ to end at $4.90.
After mid-2014’s tailings dam failure at Imperial Metals’ Mount Polley mine, the province suspended the environmental assessment for Morrison Lake.
The company was invited to submit a response to an independent report on the tailings dam collapse, and how its recommendations could affect Morrison Lake, which it did on May 11.
The company was denied an environmental assessment certificate for Morrison Lake in 2012. Near the end of 2013, however, B.C.’s Supreme Court ordered that the company’s application should be resubmitted for review, and set aside the original decision.
Be the first to comment on "TSX Venture edges up, May 11-15"