Trading Summary (February 06, 2002)

The gold issues succumbed to selling pressure on Wednesday and slid 272.83 points or 4.3% to end at 6,012.57 after running up on the strength of surging yellow metal over the past few days. Conversely, the base metal issues pulled out of their slide gaining 58.15 points to finish at 4,359.59. Overall, the Toronto Stock Exchange fell another 26.37 point closing at 7,497.1 points, with half of its 14 subindices standing in the red. Declining issues outpaced advancers 603 to 495.

After breaching the US$300-per-oz. mark earlier in the day, gold retreated to end at US$297.40 per oz. in New York. Platinum was the lone precious metal to end the day with a gain, up US$2 to US$456 per oz.

Gold miners remained among the most traded on the TSE, but went the wrong way. Barrick Gold led the slide falling 97 to $28.88 with more than 6.6 million shares changing hands. Kinross dropped 15 to $1.72; Placer Dome fell $1.62 to $20.05; South American Gold & Copper shed half a penny to 11.5; TVX Gold lost a nickel to 91 and Franco-Nevada Mining back-peddled 70 to $31.15. All of the issues saw traffic of at least 3.8 million shares.

Mid-tier producers caught in the red wave included: GoldCorp, off $1.55 to $24.60; Iamgold, which sagged 4 to $5; and Meridian Gold, off $1.98 to $21. On Wednesday, Meridian posted fourth-quarter net income of US$12.3 million (or 16 per fully diluted share) on revenue of US$31.9 million. GoldCorp is due to release its fourth-quarter numbers on Friday morning.

The base metal majors posted mostly modest gains. Inco grabbed 29 to hit $28.24; Falconbridge rose 8 to $16.38; Sherritt International gained 4 pennies to $4.30; and Alcan tacked on 89 to hit $60.10. Teck Cominco was the busiest with just fewer than a million shares traded. The issue edged up 30 to $13.50.

Canada’s junior exchange lost ground for the first time this week with decliners outpacing advancers by a 247-to-218 margin. The S&P-CDNX Composite Index dropped 3.91 points, or 0.3% to close at 1137.42.

Samex Mining topped the most actively traded chart ending the day unchanged at 14 on just over 1.3 million shares. The junior has been seeking a joint venture partner or financing for the Eskapa Core zone in Chile.

Gold Summit Mines added 1 to close at 20 on a heavy 1.1 million shares. The company recently announced a $120,000 financing and picked up several land packages totalling 300-sq-km in the Otish Mountains area of northern Quebec.

Shares in Rubicon Minerals gave back all of yesterday’s gains plus some more, losing 18 to close at 95 on a volume of 842,420. The junior announced that drilling has resumed on its Red Lake joint venture ground with Anglogold in northern Ontario.

Making a nice percentage move, Madison Enterprises added 4 to close at 14 on 796,580. The cash-strapped junior holds the rights to the Mt. Kare gold property in Papua New Guinea.

National Gold lost 2 to close at 30 on 231,919 shares. The company’s joint venture partner, Alamos Minerals is drilling the Salamandra gold property in Mexico. Alamos ended the day flat at 40 on 107,000 shares.