Last Updated :
24 May 2009 at 19:05 IST
Gold stocks to plunge as bond market set to crash
TGR: What are some of the other stocks you know that you like?
BM: The company I was telling you about, whose stock has produced a 900% return since November, is Avion Resources Corp. (TSX.V:AVR). Avion has a property in Mali that they bought from Nevsun. Ten years ago, Nevsun had a market cap of $700 million, all based on this asset in Mali. Nevsun pumped in $170 million developing a resource. It got about a million ounces of gold outlined and built the mine, but they just couldn’t operate it profitably. I went there and I was quite impressed with the mine and the mill. I was very impressed with the people.
Nevsun sold it to Avion for $20 million a year ago. It got really interesting because Avion needed to pump $20 or $30 million into drilling and getting the mill back into commission and they needed the money in October, November, and December. Of course, you couldn’t steal money at that time, so they actually sold part of the deposit to Dynamite and ended up doing a merger with Dynamite. There are about 200 million shares outstanding on the stock, and it’s about 37 cents today. They will be producing 70,000 to 75,000 ounces this year and in 18 months should be producing 200,000 ounces a year. This is going to be the next mid-tier. Other than the fact that the number of shares is a little unwieldy, it’s an absolutely wonderful story nobody knows anything about.
TGR: What’s the political risk there? BM: Pretty close to zero. Mali does a deal on every deposit. The government has a 20% carried interest and they have a 6% NSR, so they have a vested interest in seeing that they produce as much gold as possible. Believe it or not, Mali is the third biggest producer of gold in Africa. South Africa has to be number one and Tanzania probably would be number two. But Mali has a number of mines. It’s a very undeveloped country. There’s very little there in the way of infrastructure, but gold provides a substantial amount of revenue to the government. So politically I think there’s zero risk.
TGR: Any other companies that you would suggest our readers look at? BM: The Mexican silver companies. If you’re a silver bug, Mexico has the biggest silver mine in the world down at Fresnillo, which produced about 30 million ounces a year. There are a whole bunch of companies— First Majestic Silver Corp. (TSX:FR) (PK SHEET:FRMSF), Endeavour Silver Corp. (TSX:EDR) (NYSE.A:EXK), Great Panther Resources (TSX:GPR)—probably 10 or 15 really good stories in Mexico. I don’t think you could go wrong. Mexico had very little mining going from the time of the Revolution. From about 1910 until 1995, it was pretty much closed to outside investors. It’s opened up now. It’s far safer politically than the United States is and less bureaucratic than most areas in Canada, so it’s a very attractive place to invest.
TGR: What’s the latest with Pediment Gold Corp. (TSX:PEZ) (OTCBB:PEZGF) (FSE:P5E)? They were going to do an offering and then pulled back. What’s the story there? BM: They weren’t able to raise as much money as they wanted to. They didn’t have to do the financing. I personally am glad that they didn’t do the financing because they didn’t need the money. They have enough to get into production in the Baja. They have a really good guy who used to run Castle Gold, who’s now in charge of getting San Antonio into production. I’d like to see a year or 18 months from now them getting into production. I haven’t heard much lately, but the last time I talked to them about two months ago everything was moving forward.
TGR: Any updates on Castle Gold Corporation (TSX.V:CSG)?
BM: Castle is still progressing. It has enormous potential, both at the Castle Mine and San Jose. Castle Gold could be a real sleeper.
TGR: It’s had a heck of a move since last fall, almost at a 52-week high. BM: It’s a really good story, but I would like readers to understand is that there are dozens and dozens and dozens of good stories. Avion is very funny because here’s a 3½-cent stock; you’d think these are going out of business, but they picked up a million ounces of gold for $20 million. How can you beat that? There’s dozens of good stories. If somebody will do a little work and think for themselves, there’s an opportunity to make money like they never even dreamed of before.
TGR: And Timmins Gold Corp. (TSX.V:TMM)? Is that another example of that play in Mexico you were talking about?
BM: Timmins is very good. Its gold mine in Hermosillo is fairly close to getting into production. It needs to raise a little bit more money, but is moving full speed ahead and six months from now they’ll be in production. It’s another good story, good expansion capability.
TGR: So six months, that short. Great. And Fortuna Silver Mines Inc. (TSX.V:FVI)?
BM: Fortuna is near Oaxaca and also has a silver-lead-zinc mine in Peru that’s doing very well, which they’re getting no credit for whatsoever. They are building another silver mine and a mill near Oaxaca, with extremely high-grade silver. Fortuna is one of those companies that didn’t do a very good job telling their story, but they did a fabulous job of creating a story. Now they’re being a little more aggressive about telling their story. Fortuna is still really cheap.
TGR: Any U.S. companies? How about Evolving Gold (TSX.V:EVG)? BM: That’s a good one. Evolving Gold has just about as good a story as anybody I know. Rattlesnake Hills in Wyoming is the next potential Cripple Creek or Livengood. Rattlesnake Hills certainly has a potential—potential in big quotation marks—of 10 million ounces. In fact, it’s Evolving Gold that’s having the issues with the drill permit and getting the geologist in. The government in the United States has forgotten that their job is not to get in the way of business, but to make business possible.
If you like really big potential plays, International Tower Hill Mines Ltd. (TSX.V:ITH) (NYSE.A:THM) in Alaska is absolutely another home run. They’ve outlined 10 million ounces of gold at Livengood.
Both Evolving Gold and International Tower Hill are great stories and big, big ounces. They have similar size deposits.
TGR: Any other companies come to mind that you think readers should be looking at? BM: There are dozens and dozens and dozens of good companies. If you do some due diligence and go in and look at it, you will find some companies that are extraordinarily cheap.
Convinced that gold and silver were at a bottom eight years ago and wanting to give others a foundation for investing in resource stocks, Bob and Barb Moriarty brought 321gold.com to the Internet almost nine years ago. According to a recent web traffic report, the site gets more than 1.8 million hits per month. The Moriartys have added a second resource site, 321energy.com, to the family as well, covering oil, natural gas, gasoline, coal, solar, wind and nuclear energy. Its hits exceed a quarter million monthly. Both sites feature articles, editorial opinions, pricing figures and updates on the current events affecting both sectors. Before his Internet career, Bob was a Marine F-4B pilot with more than 820 missions in Vietnam. A Captain at age 22, he was one of the most highly decorated pilots in the war.
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