TSX slips over Apr. 17-21 trading week

The S&P/TSX Composite Index rose 113.09 points or 0.6% over the Apr. 17-21 trading week to 20,693.15. The S&P/TSX Global Mining Index declined 4.03 points or 3.4% to 113.15, and the S&P/TSX Global Base Metals Index lost 7.78 points or 3.9% to 192.19. The S&P/TSX Global Gold Index rose 8.45 points or 2.6% to 318.59, and spot gold ended the week US$20.10 per oz. or 1% lower, at US$1,983.90 per ounce. 

Teck Resources was the biggest value gainer over the week, as multinational Swiss miner and commodities trader Glencore said on Apr. 19 that its US$23.2-billion bid for the company — recently sweetened with a US$8.2 billion cash component —isn’t its final offer. Teck’s Class A “super-voting” shares, which carry 100 votes to one for a Class B share, rose $3.50 each or 3.6% to $100. Class B shares went up by $1.58 each or 20.1% to $62.01. 

Teck’s proposed spinout of its metallurgical coal assets (announced earlier this year) needs support of two-thirds of both shareholder groups in a scheduled meeting on Apr. 26. If the separation plan fails, Teck will need to engage with Glencore, whose advances it has so far spurned. 

Aya Gold & Silver shares rose 17¢ or 1.6% to close at $10.61. The Montreal-based miner, which operates the Zgrounder high-grade silver mine in Morocco, reported a record drill hole assay at its Boumadine exploration project in the North African country. Hole BOU-DD23-095 cut 129.4 metres of 192 grams silver equivalent per tonne (1.06 grams gold, 25 grams silver, 1% zinc, 0.2% lead and 0.03% copper), starting at 498 metres depth. The hole included several shorter intercepts of up to 16.6 metres of 443 grams silver-equivalent. 

The company is halfway through a 36,000-metre drill program, slated to finish mid-year at the project. It plans to compile an initial NI 43-101 resource for Boumadine within the next year, using that data, plus data gathered from relogging and resampling of historic drill core. Aya holds an 85% interest in Boumadine, a historic mine and polymetallic deposit located in western Morocco’s Drâa-Tafilalet region. 

In its annual results released in March, Aya posted record annual revenue of US$38.2 million and silver sales of 1.9 million oz. — up 11.5% and 28%, respectively. 

B2Gold recorded the highest trading volume for the week, with 35 million shares changing hands and the stock declining 13¢ or 2.4% to close at $5.59. On Apr. 19, the company closed its friendly, all-share acquisition of Nunavut-focused Sabina Gold & Silver — giving the gold producer its first project in Canada. The company’s $610-million Goose project is expected to begin production in 2025. Sabina made a construction decision last September, after raising about $800 million in project financing. According to a 2021 feasibility study, the project will produce an average of 223,000 oz. gold annually over a 15-year mine life (287,000 oz. gold annually over the first five years). Using a discount rate of 5% and a gold price of US$1,600 per oz., the study pegged the project’s net present value at $1.1 billion and its internal rate of return at 27.7%.