US stocks shaken in Feb. 21-25 trading week

U.S. equities posted their worst performance since November on worries related to the Libyan uprising. Spreading unrest across North Africa and the Middle East drove oil to 2-1/2 year highs and prompted accelerated safe-haven buying. When markets re-opened Tuesday after the U.S. President’s Day holiday on Feb. 21, investors were in for a tough time. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 260.8 points or 2.11% to close the abbreviated Feb. 21-25 trading week at 12,130.45 while the S&P 500 index lost 23.13 points or 1.72% to finish at 1,319.88.

Gold stocks fared better than most with the price of gold climbing US$20.50 per ounce over the course of the week to close on Feb. 25 in New York at US$1,409.60 per oz. The Philadelphia Gold and Silver index fell 0.11% to 212.21 points. Seabridge Gold advanced US$1.99 to US$33.71 per share. The company is still reveling in news of an updated resource estimate for its KSM project released on Feb. 16 that demonstrated measured and indicated resources grew by 16% to 45.3 million gold ounces (2.55 million tonnes at 0.50 gram gold per tonne), and an additional 14.5 million ounces of gold has been classified as inferred. The measured and indicated category also contains 11.9 billion lbs. copper, 256 million ounces of silver and 291 million pounds of molybdenum. An updated prefeasibility study will be completed in April. Goldcorp.,meanwhile, rose US$1.93 to US$46.98 per share on the back of strong fourth-quarter financial results. Gold production in the fourth quarter reached 689,600 ounces at total cash costs of US$164 per oz., resulting in record operating cash flows before working capital changes of US$646.1 million. Net earnings for the quarter were US$331.8 million, up from US$66.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2009. It also reported positive study results for its two major Canadian gold projects, Éléonore in Quebec and Cochenour in Red Lake, Ontario, and the approval of full-scale development of both projects by its board of directors.

The biggest value gain however was Consolidated Energy, which climbed US$3.92 to US$49.81 per share. On Feb. 24 the company announced it was promoting its chief operating officer, Nicholas J. DeIuliis, to the position of company president. Consol Energy has 11 bituminous coal mining complexes in five states and reports proven and probable coal reserves of 4.5 billion tons. It also has proven natural gas reserves of over 3.7 trillion cubic feet. 

Lingering rumors that Mosaic may be the next takeover target continued to prop up the company’s share price, which gained US$1.91 to US$84.93 per share. The shares of Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan, by contrast, dropped US$4.15 to US$60 per share. Agrium was up US$1.22 at US$94.50 per share.