Good afternoon
Initial Jobless Claims as well as continuing claims very low, but Durable Goods Orders ex Transport & Defence pretty flat...
Draghi still sees the European economy as very robust, albeit slightly less so than expected one-two month ago.
Apparently, Deripaska does not want to give up control for Rusal without a fight - that is helping industrial metals today. They were pretty weak early in the day,a nd are now trading roughly unchanged from yesterday. The strong US$ is not helping them, and certainly not gold, which is trading at 1318 US$/oz.
Equities are strong today - Facebook result is relieve for many!
A myriad of Quarterlies out today...will cover over the next few days....
West African- received Enviromental + Social Approval for their planned mine in Burkinah. I had not expected this to be a problem - yet we have seen so many hick-ups in various approval processes recently, that I do regard this as an important announcement. Company sitting on 15 mill cash - more than enough to finish the feasibility - to be announced in early June. Until then: Waiting game - we might see one ore the other drilling result. All comments are positive - the lowest price target in the market I think is 51ct ( and I think it´s worth 70ct ) - yet nobody is interested..very disappointing! I guess the absolute boredom in North Americangold inices is not helping general sentimenmt - reportedly, North American speculators have move away from mining stocks to bitcoin and marihuana....and got hurt on both! I have toa dmit, that my risk-appetite is pretty small these days as well!
Beadell - I do not believe it....stock is suspended for a placement!!!! I thought their financing needs had been done and finished with the recent debt-financing. Let´s wait for the announcement - something gone wrong here? I am very glad to ahve sold this one very long time ago...sometimes the impression of management does not ly - even though it´s such a subjective analysis. We have got this one 100% right - unfortunately, there are others out there as well, where we did not so well!!
Sheffield Resources - the most important poins from their Quarterly: Nearly 30 mill A$ in cash as at today....A lot of preliminary work done like preparing roads, construction camp etc - but the Aboriginal Approval is not there as yet. This is obviously the most important short term trigger. Taurus has been lined up for 200 mill$ financing. SFX are also talking to the Northern Australian Infartsructur Fund - ,might get some subordinated debt from them? The next hearing at the Native Title Tribunal taking place on the 18th of May - a decision might take 6 weeks. Hence the company is still negotiating themsleves - perhaps some solutions can be reached - but any documentation also would take at aleast a month. The market for SFX´s mineral sands product is still improving - Iluka, the main pure producer of mineral sands in the world, is trading at the highest level in 5 years. Would be great to get an announcement on the Native Title issue - the stock would certainly respond strongly to that! The company is still negotiating with several parties about jointly developing the project....
Newcrest - a pretty bad Quarterly....all mines except for Lihir underperformed expectations. The stock has underperformed all other, Australian quality-producers over years, and massively so....I see no reason yet to revisite - unless somebody needs quick and liquid gold exposure. They still have the ebst turneover ( 60 Mill$/day ) by a long shot - I think this is the only reason, why NCM are still trading above 20$. For "normal" investors, absolutely no reason to be there. 50-60% of NPV is based on Cadia - and we all know the multiple issues this mine complex has experienced over the last 12-18 month!
have a nice eeving
WS