Venture starts a comeback over June 14-18

Vancouver – The S&P TSX Venture Composite Index managed to gain every day but one over the June 14-18 period, ending the week up 27.8 points at 1488.18. Daily trading volumes returned to stronger levels, averaging 98.5 million.

Despite the overall gain, far more junior companies fell to new 52-week share price lows than climbed to new highs: only 23 Venture-listed companies attained new share price peaks while 177 fell to new lows.

The week’s two top traders started the week by signing a definitive merger agreement that survived three days before being trumped. KWG Resources and Spider Resources, which already share a 53% stake in the Big Daddy chromite deposit in northwest Ontario, inked a deal to exchange each Spider share for 1.21 KWG shares. But the third stakeholder in Big Daddy, Cliffs Natural Resources, then upped its bid for Spider to 16.5¢ per share, a superior offer to the KWG merger. KWG now has until June 24 to decide whether to match Cliff’s offer.

Terrane Metals had a high-volume week on news the company has hired contractors and started construction at its Mt. Milligan copper-gold project in north-central British Columbia. Terrance expects construction of the $912-million mine to take 30 months. The company moved 15.2 million shares over the week to close up 9¢ at $1.04.

Golden Hope Mines and Atac Resources should both announce drill results soon and investors must be expecting good things, as both companies saw considerable share price gains. Golden Hope added 12¢ to reach 53¢; the company just completed a 5,000-metre drill program at its Bellechasse-Timmins property in Ontario in which many holes intersected quartz veining in breccia zones up to 50 metres wide. Atac has five drills turning at its Rau project in the Keno Hill area of the Yukon, where the company plans to complete more than 100 holes. Atac gained 31¢ to close at $1.76, a new high share price.

A reality check from new CEO George Pirie sent Northern Star Mining‘s share price down 10¢ to 8¢, a far cry from the 50¢ average it maintained a year ago. Pirie, who took over in April, said the previous goal of achieving production from two of the deposits at the company’s Malartic Midway project in Quebec this year is not credible or realizable. He also called the company’s $43-million debt balance, due in 14 months, an “unsustainable obligation” and said Northern Star will seek to restructure and reduce its near-term debt.

In happier news from Quebec, Maudore Minerals announced the best intercept to date from its Comtois project. A drill probing between the Bell and Osbourne deposits hit 239 grams gold per tonne over 1.5 metres. Maudore rose 60¢ to $4.20.

Recovery of a 53.5-carat diamond in the first week of production at the Mothae mine in Lesotho sent Lucara Diamond‘s share price up 19¢ in a day to reach 98¢. The white Type IIA diamond is more than twice the size of any stone previously recovered at Mothae.

And a seemingly continuous stream of high-grade intercepts from the Nixon Fork project in Alaska lifted Fire River Gold‘s share price 19¢ to hit 60¢. Drills at Nixon Fork have returned such intercepts as 67 grams gold over 6.3 metres and 27 grams gold over 24 metres.