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Gold has traded between $1,312 and $1,323 so far today…as of 7:20 am Pacific, bullion is up $2 an ounce at $1,319…Silver is up a penny at $21.13…Copper is flat at $3.16…Crude Oil is down slightly at $105.74…Iraq’s southern oilfields, which produce most of the nation’s 3.3 million barrels per day (bpd), remain unaffected by fighting in the north and west…investors are still watching how the fight for control of Iraq’s largest refinery, the 300,000 bpd Baiji complex (110 miles north of Baghdad) unfolds…the U.S. Dollar Index has retreated one-tenth of a point to 80.12…

Anticipation of a dip in the price of Gold (in the local market) and rekindled interest in resurgent equities in India are holding back bullion buying in that country at the moment, according to traders.  “There is a feeling in the market that the import duty would be reduced from 10% to 4% in the upcoming budget,” said Sanjay Kothari, with a bullion investing firm. “If that happens and the rupee continues to remain strong, Gold prices can come down massively to $399 (Rs 24,000) from the current $449 (Rs 27,000) per 10 gram.”

Once the darling of mining investors venturing in Latin America, world’s top Copper producer Chile is becoming one of the most expensive countries to explore and mine…according to data from the country’s Copper Commission, the cost of producing a pound of Copper in Chile went from 63 cents U.S. per pound in 2004 (which was half of Africa and well below the world average at the time) to $2.50 last year – above the global average of $2.38…electricity costs in Latin America’s wealthiest economy have climbed 11% per year since 2000, making it one of the most expensive places in the world to secure energy for mining projects…the same study shows that only two mining jurisdictions last year were more expensive than Chile – Europe and Asia…

Today’s Equity Markets

Asia

China’s Shanghai Composite fell 2 points overnight to close the week at 2037…meanwhile, Japan’s Nikkei average tumbled 213 points or nearly 1.5% to 15095…Japan is having success pulling out of a deflationary cycle – fresh data today showed that core consumer prices in May rose at their fastest pace since 1982…

Europe

European markets are mixed in late trading overseas…

North America

The Dow is down 45 points as of 7:20 am Pacific…U.S. consumer sentiment rose in June as consumers remained optimistic the sluggish first quarter was due to difficult winter conditions, a survey released this morning showed…the Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan’s final June reading on the overall index on consumer sentiment came in at 82.5, slightly above expectations and up from 81.9 the month before…

The TSX has gained 11 points while the Venture, trying to snap a mild 4-session losing skid, is up 2 points at 1015 through the first 50 minutes of trading…

Fed’s Bullard:  “That’s Shocking”

The U.S. jobless rate will fall below 6% and inflation looks likely to rise back to 2% later this year, putting the economy closer to normal than most realize, a top Federal Reserve official said yesterday.  “You are basically going to be near normal on both dimensions basically later this year,” St. Louis Fed President James Bullard (not in the FOMC in 2014, considered a centrist), speaking in an interview on Fox Business Network. “That’s shocking, and I don’t think markets, and I’m not sure policymakers, have really digested that that’s where we are.”

Bullard reiterated his belief that raising rates by the end of the first quarter in 2015 will be appropriate, based on his forecast that U.S. growth will register 3% for the next four quarters…if data disappoint, he said, he will revise that forecast…later yesterday, Bullard spoke at the Council on Foreign Relations, saying that at the current 6.3% rate of unemployment, the United States is “way ahead of schedule” on its trajectory toward a normal labor market…he added that that Federal Reserve may be behind the curve if the unemployment rate drops faster than expected, but he is confident that it will act appropriately…he also said that he believes the U.S. is no longer in a low inflation environment, and that inflation will continue to tick higher and rise above 2% next year…

Copper Chart Update

Copper has rallied strongly since plunging during the first quarter to a low of $2.88 in mid-March…technically, the metal’s immediate challenge is to overcome resistance at $3.20 as you can see on this 2.5-year weekly chart…the Venture signaled earlier that Copper’s decline was nothing to worry about, and it’s telling us now that the metal should strengthen further in Q3 – perhaps challenging resistance around $3.40…

We have some interesting individual company charts to finish off the week – GSV, ICG, GGI, NAN and HBK…

Gold Standard Ventures Corp. (GSV, TSX-V) Update 

One reason we’re so bullish regarding the Venture’s prospects in Q3 is because of the multitude of individual stocks that have broken above long-term downtrend lines…Gold Standard Ventures (GSV, TSX-V), currently drilling its promising Railroad-Pinion Project in Nevada, is another classic example as you can see in this 3-year weekly chart…GSV could really take off if it’s able to break above a 14-month horizontal channel…

GSV is unchanged at 85 cents as of 7:20 am Pacific…

Integra Gold Corp. (ICG, TSX-V) Update

This chart comes at the request of a reader but it’s also another demonstration of what we just mentioned above – look what happened after ICG broke above its downtrend line early this year…it climbed as high as 42 cents before retracing all the way back to the top of its downtrend line which is new support…

As Integra continues to advance its Lamaque Property in Quebec, keep in mind the company is currently completing a financing which it has expanded to $10 million (expected to close any day now) through the issuance of up to 50 million common shares (20 cents per non-flow-through unit and 26 cents per flow-through share)…that’s significant dilution, and a financing earlier this year at at higher price would have made more sense (easier said than done perhaps), but those shares won’t become free trading until late October/early November…in the meantime, ICG should find support at the uptrend line with a good chance for a strong push higher during Q3…

Garibaldi Resources Corp. (GGI, TSX-V) Update

Garibaldi has been delivering on the ground all year and there’s every reason to believe that’s going to continue, in both Mexico and northwest British Columbia…more results are expected shortly from the Silver Eagle target at Rodadero, which has all the earmarks of a significant near-surface high-grade discovery, plus GGI is also busy elsewhere in Mexico and with the highly prospective Grizzly Property in the Sheslay district…

This 10-year monthly chart for GGI says it all – Garibaldi has made an impressive move over the last year from a low of 4.5 cents to a recent high of 28 cents, but all the technical indicators (supported by developments on the ground) suggest GGI has a lot further to go on the upside…this type of scenario usually leads to new all-time highs…

North American Nickel Inc. (NAN, TSX-V) Update

Like GGI, NAN has proceeded according to script – it has been a star performer in 2014 with drilling now in progress at the company’s 100%-owned 100%-owned Maniitsoq Ni-Cu-PGE Project in southwest Greenland…a second rig will be put into action around mid-July…this group has put a powerful geological context together for Maniitsoq – now the “truth machine” is at work with a good chance for outstanding results…

NAN has staged a confirmed breakout above measured Fib. resistance at 51 cents…given normal market volatility, and the possibility of an “unwinding” of temporarily overbought conditions, NAN could test support around 50 cents which is also currently just above the rising 50-day moving average (SMA) which has underpinned the stock price since the beginning of the year…

NAN is off 7 cents at 54 cents as of 7:20 am Pacific…

Highbank Resources Ltd. (HBK, TSX-V) Update

Highbank Resources‘ (HBK, TSX-V) news yesterday morning was a little strangely “over the top” given the subject matter (mobilization of equipment and personnel), but nonetheless the company is moving closer to the production stage at its Swamp Point North aggregate project along tidewater near Stewart…HBK has performed very well over the last few months, climbing by more than 40% since we introduced it to our readers…

Technically, HBK is dealing with resistance around the 20-cent level as shown on this 10-year monthly chart…it’s unchanged at 21.5 cents as of 7:20 am Pacific…

Note:  John and Jon both hold share positions in GGI.