Toronto Stock Exchange (February 03, 1992)

Shares of Agnico-Eagle Mines and affiliate Goldex Mines reacted to drill results from an area north of the LaRonde mine in Quebec during the week ended Jan. 28.

News that Agnico had cut a 9.5-ft. intersection averaging 0.25 oz. gold per ton, 6.45% zinc and 0.13% copper in one of several zones located 1,700 ft. east of the mine shaft drove Agnico up 75 cents to $5.50. With drilling to resume this month, Goldex was up 25 cents to $1.

An announcement that Placer Dome has agreed to assist International Corona in developing the Eskay Creek gold deposit in British Columbia was greeted with less enthusiasm by investors. While 1.7 million Placer Dome shares changed hands during the report period, the issue gave up 25 cents. Corona was also down 25 cents on a volume of 635,000 shares.

Admittedly the Vancouver-based gold miners didn’t get much help from a flagging gold price which fell this week by US$2 before closing today, Jan. 29, at US$354.85 per oz. in London. Platinum is now within striking distance of the yellow metal after moving up US$6.75 per oz. this week to US$346.50. U.S. President George Bush’s attempt to boost the North American economy and his own flagging fortunes via the State of the Union Address failed to pull Toronto share prices out of their recent slide.

Today, the downward trend continued as the composite 300 index fell by 24.64 points to 3598.61, after 27.8 million shares worth $325 million changed hands. American Barrick Resources, one of the stellar performers in recent weeks, continued to back off from a recent high of $34.25 even though it has reached an agreement with Newmont Gold on development of the rich Post gold deposit in Nevada. Barrick closed today at $31.50.

Royal Oak Mines, the volume leader this week with over two million shares exchanged, yielded 2 cents to close at $2.05. Hatched last July in a merger with the Pamour group, Royal Oak was one of the top performers among mining stocks in 1991, according to a survey by First Marathon Securities. It was second only to copper mining specialist Arimetco International which closed at $3.90, after losing 10 cents today.

Claude Resources remained steady at $1.25 as the company prepares to resume drilling at its Seabee gold mine in Saskatchewan where cost overruns have interfered with the production timetable. Claude is also trying to reschedule debts owed to contractors.

Touted by Robert Bishop’s Gold Mining Stock Report for its growth potential, Amax Gold was unchanged after falling 63 cents to $13.50. Bishop expects Amax to double its output by 1995 by bringing on the Fort Knox and Hayden Hill projects. The company also has two advanced stage exploration projects, the Guanaco in northern Chile and the Haile in South Carolina. Noranda said today it had sold nine million shares of Hemlo Gold Mines at $11 each to a syndicate led by Burns Fry, Gordon Capital and RBC Dominion Securities. Noranda’s 44 million Hemlo shares fell 38 cents on that news to $11.13. On the base metals front, a 1 cents dip in the price of Inco shares indicates that 1991 earnings of $82.6 million were in line with what the market had been expecting. Last year the nickel giant earned $441.2 million. However, the closing of Minnova’s planned purchase of Falconbridge’s stake in three Northwest Territories base metal properties, including the advanced Izok Lake, failed to ignite the stock. Minnova was unchanged today at $16 after yielding 63 cents in the report period.

As announced previously, the purchase price paid to Falconbridge was US$20 million and included a 3% net smelter royalty, payable two years after production starts and limited to a 5-year period or US$12.5 million, whichever occurs later.

Minnova is also gearing up for a $600,000 program on Freewest Resources’ Lac Pusticamica property in Quebec where the junior hit 53-ft. of grade 0.18 oz. gold and 20 ft. of grade 0.23 oz. last year. An agreement signed recently allows Minnova to earn 51% in 368 claims by spending $4 million over four years. Freewest gave up 10 cents today as three rigs were moving on to the property.

As Beaufield Resources moved to finance exploration on a Benoit Twp. property northeast of Freewest, 939,400 of the company’s shares were changing hands this week. Trading at 7 cents, Beaufield is finalizing a financing agreement that will fund a gold joint

venture with Beauchamps

Exploration.