Golds glitter on junior exchange

Vancouver — Canada’s junior exchange continued its love affair with bullion over the holiday-shortened trading week that ended Jan 6. The S&P-TSX Venture Exchange composite index added 55.5 points, or 3.21% of value, to close at 1,782.38.

IBI closed at 6.5, up half a penny with a whopping 6.4 million shares traded. The company has applied to become a tier-one trader on the Venture Exchange, while changing its trading symbol to IBI. The junior has 244 million shares outstanding and operates a vermiculite mine in Uganda.

ECU Silver Mining finished the week at 33, up 7 with 4.8 million shares traded. The company recently resumed mining and milling at its Santa Juana operation in Mexico, and intends to carry out drilling to define the extension of the vein system. Ownership of the mine has been the subject of legal dispute, and a decision is awaited.

Stroud Resources closed at 19, up 3 with 3.8 million shares traded. The company is exploring for gold and other precious metals in Ontario and Mexico. Among its assets are a half-stake in the Santo Domingo epithermal silver-gold project in central Mexico and 100% interests in the Hislop gold property, near Timmins, Ont., and the Leckie gold property, near North Bay, Ont. Stroud also generates cash flow from a 3.75% interest in two natural gas condensate wells in central Alberta.

Eurasia Gold closed at 13, up 2 with 3.15 million shares traded. The company operates two gold mines in Kazakstan. The remaining minable reserves, as per the Russian resource data submitted to the Kazakstani authorities, is estimated at 140,000 oz. Toronto-listed Thistle Mining holds an aggregate of 68.2 million shares, or 57.7%, of Eurasia. The shares were acquired for investment purposes.

Making a nice percentage gain, Sur American Gold surged 43 to close at $1.08 with 2.3 million shares traded. The junior reported surface values of up to 781.5 grams gold per tonne from ongoing bulk-sampling at the Comval gold project in the Philippines.

Gold Crest Resources added 21 to its value and closed at 61 with 2.03 million shares traded. Formerly Ventaur Capital, Goldcrest has started work on its Youanmi property, 400 km northeast of Kalgoorlie in Australia. The junior expected to complete a 1,000-metre drill program before the end of 2003.

Taseko Mines jumped 31 and finished the week at $2.29 with 2.03 million shares traded. A mining investment partnership is looking to raise up to $35 million in a bid to resume operations at the historic Gibraltar copper mine in south-central British Columbia. The limited partnership, known as the Gibraltar Reclamation Trust (GRT), agreed to finance a qualifying environmental trust, which will allow the operating subsidiary of owner Taseko Mines to gain access to funds already held as a reclamation bond by the provincial government. For its part, Taseko is contributing the mine assets and has agreed to finance startup expenses for the Gibraltar mine. The Hunter-Dickinson-led junior then inked a 1-year option to buy the GRT partnership for 130% of the contribution made by GRT to the environmental trust, estimated at 90% of the financing. The agreement, which is restricted to 2004, is payable in stock or cash.