Gold traded as low as $1,227 this morning but got a strong boost on the release of a weak U.S. non-farm payrolls report for December…as of 7:30 am Pacific, bullion is up $17 an ounce at $1,245…Silver has gained 57 cents to $20.12…Copper has added 4 cents to $3.32…Crude Oil is nearly $1 a barrel higher at $92.59 while the U.S. Dollar Index has tumbled one-third of a point to 80.64…
TD Securities looks for Gold and Silver to slide some more, but not dramatically, in the early months of 2014 now that the Fed has started to taper its bond-buying program…TD then looks for the metal to stabilize and rise in the latter part of the year with the help of continued interest in Asia and renewed investment demand while the Fed likely to keep interest rates low despite an uptick in core inflation…Platinum and Palladium are among its favored metals for the year…
More predictions, for what they’re worth…Barclays expects Gold to average $1,205 an ounce in 2014 but test the 2010 lows in the process, according to an outlook report released yesterday…Silver is seen averaging $19, Platinum $1,539 and Palladium $768…
Gold has become inexpensive compared to Crude Oil, says investor and newsletter writer Dennis Gartman…he points out that it takes slightly more than 13 barrels of West Texas Intermediate crude oil to buy an ounce of Gold currently, compared to 22.5 barrels back in late 2011…the ratio fell as low as 11.5 barrels last July, he says. “Gold is cheap relative to crude oil, or Crude Oil is expensive relative to Gold; we care not which ‘position’ one wishes to see as relevant,” Gartman says. “However, as we watch gold buying continue at a heady pace in China and even too in India despite the latter’s government’s attempt to quell demand, we are impressed.” He says “the time for being short Gold is now behind us” but has refrained from turning bullish, with the exception of a long Gold/short Japanese yen position…“We are still refraining from doing so, but rest assured that our interest is piquing and our propensity to act is rising,” Gartman concludes (source: Kitco)…
Long-Term Chart: Gold vs. U.S. 10-Year Treasury Note Yield
An interesting chart from John comparing Gold with the 10-Year Treasury Note yield (TNX), which we’ll comment on more next week…the yield has fallen this morning to 2.89% after encountering resistance again around 3.00%…
Weak U.S. Jobs Report
This was surprising, especially considering the strong private sector ADP jobs report earlier this week…the U.S. Labor Department reported this morning that job creation stumbled in December (the worst month in nearly 2 years) with the economy adding just 74,000 positions even as the Fed voted to take the first steps in eliminating its stimulus program…the unemployment rate dropped to 6.7%, below economists’ estimates and due primarily to continued shrinkage in the labor force…the labor force participation rate tumbled to 62.8%, its worst level since January 1978…
China Overtakes U.S. As World’s Biggest Trader
China became the world’s biggest trader in goods for the first time last year, overtaking the U.S. for all of 2013 and finishing the year with record trade figures for December…the total value of China’s imports and exports in 2013 was $4.16 trillion, a 7.6% increase from a year earlier on a renminbi-adjusted basis, according to figures released by the Chinese government today…the U.S. will release its full-year figures in February but its total imports and exports of goods amounted to $3.57 trillion in the 11 months from January to November 2013, making it a virtual certainty that China is now the world’s biggest goods trading nation…
China’s exports in December came in lower than expected, rising at an annual rate of 4.3%…imports, however, beat forecasts with an 8.3% year-over-year rise, up from 5.3% in November…they were boosted by high raw-material shipments…China brought in 6.33 million barrels a day of Crude Oil in December, a record, and Copper, iron ore and plastic imports were up strongly, too…
Today’s Markets
Asian markets were mixed overnight…China’s Shanghai Composite fell to a new 5-month low for a 2nd straight session following as investors continued to fret about a glut of IPO’s…the Shanghai fell 14 points to 2013…Japan’s Nikkei average climbed 32 points to finish the week at 15912…European shares are up moderately in late trading overseas…in New York, the Dow is off 23 points as of 7:30 Pacific…
Thanks to strength in commodities today, the TSX is up 84 points through the first hour of trading while the Venture has added another 4 points to 961…the Venture has strung together a very impressive 12-session winning streak, topping the longest consecutive daily advances in 2010 (11) and 2011 (10) during a rip-roaring bull market…
Dynasty Gold Corp. (DYG, TSX-V)
Over the next couple of weeks we’ll be highlighting some “cheapies” trading at 2 cents or less that have a chance in 2014…one of those is certainly Dynasty Gold (DYG, TSX-V) which was hoping to drill its promising early-stage Strike Property near Stewart last summer but didn’t receive its permits in time…the Strike, which has Gold-Silver and base metal (Cu-Pb-Zn) potential, with high-grade Silver and Zinc surface sampling results reported in November 2012, is underlain by Jurassic sedimentary and volcanic rocks of the Hazelton group – the same rocks that hosted the mineralization at the former Eskay Creek mine…the goal at the Strike will be to intercept precious and base metal enriched veins and potential strata-bound polymetallic mineralization at depth, particularly over the northern part of the property which appears to be the most prospective based on geophysical data…
Dynasty has a low burn rate and is sitting on just over $1 million in cash, certainly enough to kick-start a drill program this summer…below is a 2.5-year weekly chart from John…support is at 1 cent, an excellent entry point in our view for patient investors, with resistance between 2 and 4 cents…the company’s cash position, and the chance of a hit at the Strike, limits the likelihood of a rollback at the present time…
Encanto Potash Corp. (EPO, TSX-V) Chart Update
Technical alert from John – Encanto Potash (EPO, TSX-V) is on the rebound, having put in what appears to be a double bottom and now breaking above a downtrend line and an RSI(14) trend line…EPO is unchanged at 16.5 cents as of 7:30 am Pacific…
Barisan Gold Corp. (BG, TSX-V) Chart Update
Barisan Gold (BG, TSX-V) took a hit yesterday, falling 12 cents to close at 21.5 cents – its lowest close since November 19…the company reported very solid assay results from most of recently completed hole UTD-004 at its Upper Tengkereng Project in Indonesia, but they weren’t spectacular enough to satisfy some of the speculators who came into this play over the last couple of months…drilling of UTD-005 starts shortly…geologically, this story is still very much intact…technically, in terms of the stock, the Fib. 15-cent retracement level coincides with the rising 100-day moving average (SMA), so that’s clearly a major support price support level…a band of support runs from 15 to 21 cents…below is a 2+ year weekly chart from John…
Note: John and Jon both hold share positions in BG and DYG.
I think i found a gem, that is, if they know how the game
is played. DGO with only 5 million shares o/s. Can you
believe there is a company with only 5 million shares o/s.
Anyway, if you believe in XME & Zen, just take a look
at where DGO is located. It will be a play on it’s own,
or a play feeding off ZEN or XME. Check it out. R !
Comment by bert — January 10, 2014 @ 8:42 am
Great looking find Bert. Another stock with potential. I too am awaiting news release from GGI. I bought a few more a couple of days ago. This stock has great potential but the truth machine will tell all. Her is hoping. Richard l
Comment by Richard l — January 10, 2014 @ 9:23 am
Hi Jon, anything on the special alert for GGI?
Comment by Dan — January 10, 2014 @ 9:28 am
It’s in the early process of going out.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 10, 2014 @ 9:31 am
To show my friends that i will never bring forward
a stock that i have no faith in, please be advised
that i am the only buyer today, 10K shares. Not a
lot but a start. R !
Comment by bert — January 10, 2014 @ 9:55 am
Have a look at TNR Gold as a cheapie.
Comment by Doug — January 10, 2014 @ 10:12 am
I’m about to join u, Bert, in adding to my holdings, so you’re not alone today. We’ll see who’s up next. Nice strength in Gold today.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 10, 2014 @ 10:25 am
I was referring to DGO in post # 5- Have a good weekend everyone. R !
Bert
Comment by bert — January 10, 2014 @ 10:38 am
I put an order in for 20K… then 10K and got 1500… now ask’d at 13… very thin….
Comment by Jeremy — January 10, 2014 @ 10:43 am
BTW thx Bert!!!:)
Comment by Jeremy — January 10, 2014 @ 10:43 am
http://web.tmxmoney.com/news.php?qm_symbol=DGO
check out the news stream!!
Comment by Jeremy — January 10, 2014 @ 10:46 am
decided on 5K dgo and 5k xme:) first stock buy in a year….
Comment by Jeremy — January 10, 2014 @ 10:51 am
DGO
3 lots for sale at 0.13, next at 0.18. With only 5 million
shares o/s wouldn’t take much sometime in the future. R !
Comment by bert — January 10, 2014 @ 10:56 am
How quick a stock can turn around. LXV traded at 0.41
earlier today & of course, i was troubled. Right now
it is 0.52-0.53. Even on a Friday afternoon we should
not give up, although at times i find that difficult.
Full speed ahead. R !
Comment by bert — January 10, 2014 @ 11:14 am
Have a look at v.sff as a cheapy..
Comment by Magnus — January 10, 2014 @ 11:35 am
Action ahead maybe on DBV.V double view res. no. of shares to-day has ramped up, results coming up. This was a hail mary drill hole on their propertyadbutting PGX. If they hit that would be good news for sheslay play. Richard l
Comment by Richard l — January 10, 2014 @ 4:35 pm
NEWS expected on xme on Monday or Tuesday
Comment by gil — January 10, 2014 @ 5:13 pm
2014 stock picks graphite2up 31.63 stocking stuffer5 up 4.33 bmr20 up 2.70 percent
Comment by gil — January 10, 2014 @ 5:21 pm
LXV had a massive signing today. Cristiano Ronaldo – Soccer superstar, largest sports social media following on the planet. Looks like LXV is for real and ready for flight. I bought in the mid 40’s and will hold til buyout. Do your own dd.
Comment by Dan — January 10, 2014 @ 7:30 pm
If you have been caught investing in a junior explorer on the TSX Venture Exchange within the past two years, your experience is almost certainly a negative one. Cash is king right now and any explorer that is out of cash has seen their stock price deteriorate significantly as the capital markets realize that those companies will need to finance or will die off which will enable the vultures to pick up their assets for very cheap. The solution to this is to pick up shares of junior explorers with a lot of cash, several million dollars or more. But those are often hard to come by and usually have very high amounts of shares outstanding as they had to undergo large dilution to get that cash.
An alternative to this plan is to pick up shares in companies which will have their drilling paid for them. While doing so usually results in the company giving up a piece of their property, the advantages to this are that it can continue to operate without the fear of massive dilution or running out of capital.
One such company is Santa Barbara Resources (SBL.V). Like most juniors, they have just enough cash to maintain working capital requirements but not enough to undergo a significant drill program. SBL got around this little problem by signing an agreement with Rio Alto Mining on June 27, 2013 where RIO has the right to acquire up to 66% of SBL’s Sancos property by spending $4.5M on drilling of the property within the next three years, filing all necessary actions to make Sancos a producing property and paying $1M to SBL. SBL maintains operations for at least the first year of the agreement. Drill results are here.
While SBL gives up two-thirds of its rights to Sancos, with only 25M shares outstanding this was the right decision in order to maximize shareholder value. Giving up two-thirds of the property is the equivalent of diluting the shares to triple the base to 75M. It would have been unlikely for SBL to be able to sell 50M shares in order to get what they got from RIO which is $4.5M in drill commitments, $1M in cash and preparation of production should the property get that far.
The $4.5M in drill commitments and $500K of the $1M payment is for the right to 51% of the property. That would essentially be the equivalent of a 100% dilution of SBL’s stock or 25M shares. $5M worth of commitments for 25M shares would mean RIO values SBL at the equivalent of 20 cents a share for this property.
Given the low share float, strong support from a larger partner in RIO, lack of need to finance and pending drill results, SBL is one of the strongest candidates for success in these terrible times for junior explorers.
Santa Barbara Signs Definitive Agreement with Rio Alto Mining for Sancos Property in Peru
Vancouver, British Columbia CANADA, June 27, 2013 /FSC/ – Santa Barbara Resources Limited,(TSX-V: SBL – “Santa Barbara” or the “Company”) is pleased to announce that it has executed a definitive agreement (the “Agreement”) to supersede a non-binding letter of intent with Rio Alto Mining Limited (“Rio Alto”) announced on February 7, 2013. Santa Barbara has granted Rio Alto an option to earn and acquire up to a 66% interest in the Company’s 8,200 hectare Sancos gold property in Peru (the “Sancos Project”).
Santa Barbara is the operator of the Sancos Project in the first year of the Agreement, and is pleased to report that it has already reached community agreements with the two local communities affected by exploration activities on the Sancos Project. Santa Barbara has received a drill permit for the Sancos Project from the Peruvian Ministry of Energy and Mines, authorizing the construction of up to 300 individual drill platforms and related access roads over a period of 48 months. Access roads and a total of 22 drill platforms were previously constructed by Santa Barbara so that there is now full access and permitting to conduct its planned exploration programs on the Sancos Project, including drilling.
The technical staffs of Santa Barbara and Rio Alto are finalizing the design and preparations for an exploration program to be conducted over the first year of the Agreement.
Under the terms of the Agreement, Rio Alto will have the option to acquire up to an initial 51% interest in the Sancos Project within a three year period by incurring an aggregate of US$4.5 million expenditures on the Sancos Project at the minimum rate of US$1.5 million a year (the “51% Program”). Completion of the first year of the 51% Program, including a minimum 5,000 metre drilling program, is a firm commitment. The purpose of the 51% Program is to carry out exploration on the Sancos Project with a view to identifying and defining mineral resources of sufficient magnitude to justify on a commercially reasonable basis the undertaking of a preliminary economic assessment (scoping study) of the Sancos Project in compliance with NI 43-101. Rio Alto will also pay US$500,000 to Santa Barbara upon its acquisition of the 51% interest.
Rio Alto may earn an additional 15% interest in the Sancos Project within the subsequent two year period by undertaking all necessary actions required to prepare the Sancos Project for a production decision, including obtaining permits required from the applicable Peruvian government authorities and preparing a feasibility study in respect of the Sancos Project in compliance with the requirements of NI 43-101. Rio Alto will pay a further US$500,000 to Santa Barbara upon its acquisition of the 15% interest.
Within 90 days of the 15% option exercise date, Santa Barbara may elect to participate proportionally in the costs of the development and construction of a mine on the Sancos Project and maintain its interest in the Sancos Joint Venture at 34%, or allow Rio Alto to arrange for project financing for the mine construction, including Santa Barbara’s proportional share, in which case Rio Alto will have acquired an additional 9% interest in the Sancos Project, leaving Santa Barbara with a 25% interest in the Sancos Project. Rio Alto would then have the right to recover Santa Barbara’s proportional share of the project financing from up to 80% of Santa Barbara’s share of cash distributions under the Sancos Joint Venture.
Christoph Lassl commented: “We are delighted with the fact that we have completed a legally binding formal agreement with Rio Alto and also have long term community agreements in place allowing us to explore the Sancos Project. We will work now with Rio Alto on the further development of our flagship Sancos high-sulphidation epithermal gold project. Rio Alto has a proven track record of resource definition and mine development in Peru making them an ideal partner for Santa Barbara. The Company looks forward to commencing the exploration program and reporting milestone results as the work unfolds and results are received.”
Sancos Project:
The Sancos Project is located in the mining-friendly Ayacucho Region of Peru. The property hosts a large high-sulphidation epithermal gold-silver mineralized system. The Sancos Project encompasses 8,200 hectares with 2,000 hectares held directly by Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara has the option, subject to certain back-in rights, to acquire a 100% interest in the remaining 6,200 hectares of the Sancos project from Barrick Gold’s Peruvian subsidiary (the “Barrick Option”). The terms of the Barrick Option, including Barrick’s back-in right in certain circumstances, are described in the notes to the annual financial statements of Santa Barbara. During the term of the Agreement, Rio Alto will fund Santa Barbara to make cash payments due to Barrick pursuant to the Barrick Option. If Barrick exercises its back-in right after Rio Alto has earned an interest, Santa Barbara and Rio Alto will be diluted pro rata and the back-in purchase price, of three times each parties’ expenditures on the Sancos Project, will be paid proportionally to their participation in the Project at the time of the Barrick back-in.
About the Company
Santa Barbara is a South American mineral explorer focusing on Peru and Chile. The Company has 25.3 million shares outstanding.
ON BEHALF OF THE BOARD
“Christoph Lassl”
Comment by Sebastian — January 10, 2014 @ 9:08 pm
SBL share is at 3 cents should be valued 20 cents. This my friends is golden opportunity to invest in a low risk cheapy. 25mil shares, RIO Alto pays for all exploration expenditures, can’t be better. Do your own DD.
Comment by Sebastian — January 10, 2014 @ 9:38 pm
DGO looks very exciting from the share structure point of view! If DBV takes off, look out for ABR too as it is tied onto it!
Comment by STEVEN1 — January 11, 2014 @ 8:25 am
You bring up a good point, Richard, about some interesting action recently in DBV including yesterday. I like the Hat Property but I wish I could have more faith in that company’s ability to make a discovery there. They simply don’t have the geo expertise that PGX and GGI have, and that’s key to making things happen. Management, geo expertise are always critical factors. The Hat would be better off IMHO in the hands of those operators, or another operator that also has the money and the expertise like PGX and GGI. DBV is basically out of money now. So Farshad needs to get lucky or consider getting into the medicinal marijuana business which TOP is having success with. I hope I’m proven wrong on this, or that DBV simply gets lucky on a hole.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 11, 2014 @ 9:36 am
Jon, what do you think of SBL?
Comment by Sebastian — January 11, 2014 @ 9:56 am
Re: SBL….Gold grades aren’t high enough at this point to really excite the market. They’re getting thick intercepts of lower-grade material which is very encouraging, but they need to define a significant higher grade zone and that’s going to take more drilling. Good JV partner to fund the exploration expenses, and the geology is interesting, so this has a chance. Probably hard to go wrong buying at these levels and waiting for things to develop over the coming months and the balance of the year. They DO need to find higher grade which is what they’re attempting to do. Not a lot of stock outstanding, so that’s certainly helpful.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 11, 2014 @ 10:11 am
Jon: What’s your take on the Venture with all these ‘back to back’ days of slowly getting back to that 970 level?….this is what the 3rd or 4th attempt? Spoke with alot of brokers who said if it can get thru the 970-985 range, it’s on it’s way to alot higher! Hope to hear your opinion soon!
Comment by STEVEN1 — January 11, 2014 @ 10:26 am
Very interesting situation shaping up with the Venture, Steven, which we’ll be reviewing in our Week In Review tomorrow. As we’ve been stating repeatedly, the turnaround this time is for real, and the genesis of it was when the Venture broke above its long-term downtrend line in October. The fact we’ve seen 13 straight up days at this point is no coincidence – smart money sees what’s developing, momentum is picking up, and numerous indicators are now showing confirmation of this turnaround. Key resistance, as you mentioned, is in the 970’s. It’s just a question of when, not if, this will be cleared. A few days, a few weeks? We’ll see. Once that does occur, expect volume to pick up dramatically and it’s off to the races, with the 970’s as new support. One must be selective still, however – focus on the companies with strong management teams, healthy balance sheets, excellent properties, current activity, attractive share structures, etc.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 11, 2014 @ 10:58 am
Jon, with all due respect if DBV hits it won’t be based on luck it will be based in the hard work Farshad has done and his knowledge of the area, he choose the Hat property after looking at all the areas. Pgx has done Air born survey on the eniire property of DBV, wonder why! Pgx had an opportunity to find a huge discovery on the last drill program and although the find was okay it was far from a major discovery to suggest the DBV should be in the hands of PgX is rediculous. Let’s give Farshad the respect he deserves and will gain after the drill results are announced, yes DbV needs to succeed here and I believe they will and who knows maybe Pgx should be in the hands of DBV if they hit! It’s very ignorant of you to suggest hat Farshad should go into medicinal marihuana, pgx with all it’s money and expertise did not come out with a monster as you had led members of this board to believe!
Paul
Comment by Paul — January 11, 2014 @ 11:04 am
Paul, I respect your views, and I hope you’re right, but I have no faith in the DBV management group and I’m not the only one who has that opinion. With regard to PGX, they haven’t even drilled step-out holes yet. With half a dozen holes they confirmed results from 2 dozen historical holes at the Star and also showed that mineralization does extend deeper. The extensive geophysical and other work that was completed by PGX does provide ample evidence of a major discovery in the making as it appears the Star will connect with the North Star, and perhaps other porphyry targets on the property. The game is just starting at the Sheslay, and the Grizzly for that matter. Watch how it heats up. I don’t discount the effort Farshad has put into the Hat, but right now he’s out of money and (pardon the pun) literally needs to pull a rabbit out of the hat. I wish him luck.
You stated, “PGX has done Air born survey on the entire property of DBV, wonder why!”. You know why? Because of course the property has potential, I’ve stated that all along. But sometimes properties are simply in the wrong hands.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 11, 2014 @ 11:27 am
Jon, I’m curious to know if you have actually spoken to Frashad or any of his management team or is this based on your conversations with Peter,. Have you ever done any background on Frashad. If so so please share it with the rest of the board. Peter has stated that he may want to take over DBV, I know that as a fact, so if you going solely on his info your not doing your DD. I agree that Farshad needs to have good results on this drill program but if you have spoken to him although he maintains a high level of integrity it sounds like things will be good, just my speculation at this time but I’m sure we will know soon enough. I realize PGx has a lot of work to do yet, but you were the one suggesting that Peter would not put a halt on results that were poor, you were also the one taking about a major hole coming out of pgx.
Comment by Paul — January 11, 2014 @ 11:44 am
Jon, thanks for your thoughts regarding SBL. Another question, what do you think of CQX? They had quite impressing results from their Gold strike property in Utah. I know they are out of cash and they need a financing. But do you think in regard of their great property that they can be a candidate of a JV?
Comment by Sebastian — January 11, 2014 @ 11:50 am
You’re right – I did say Peter would not put a halt on results that were poor, and the results were very good. Those six holes were solid, very solid, and every indication – not just from the remarkable consistency of grades and intersections from about 30 holes at the Star – but the geophysical and soil data that PGX completed is that they’re well on their way to putting together a major deposit or series of deposits at the Sheslay. Highly respected geologists have the same opinion. The absence of winter drilling hurt PGX’s share price significantly – the share price drop had nothing to do with how this property is coming together. My opinion of the DBV management group is based on wide-ranging DD by our team that we did with regard to this entire play over several months last year. Farshad could have helped his cause with me but never returned my phone call. Others in my circle/network have spoken with him.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 11, 2014 @ 12:06 pm
Thanks for your analysis but hate to say it the market responded to the results from PgX, no matter what you think, the market speaks loudest. It’s too bad Farshad never responded, let me know if you ever want to speak to him.
K
Comment by Paul — January 11, 2014 @ 12:18 pm
Like I said, Paul, I do respect the fact Farshad has worked hard on this project and I’m hoping for his sake, and the sake of all DBV shareholders, that he can report some great news. Would love to see DBV hit something significant and the share price take off.
Comment by Jon - BMR — January 11, 2014 @ 12:21 pm
Thx Jon, we both agree on that!
Comment by Paul — January 11, 2014 @ 12:25 pm
Jon, what do you think of CQX? They had quite impressing results from their Gold strike property in Utah. I know they are out of cash and they need a financing. But do you think in regard of their great property that they can be a candidate of a JV?
Comment by Sebastian — January 11, 2014 @ 11:21 pm