Eric O's Favorite Gold Miners

Market cap of about $3.7B.  2011 production guidance of 380,000 to 400,000 ounces.  More to come in 2012.  Pierre Lassonde is on the Board.  Pierre is a legend in the mining business, and probably the best way to get the case for the stock is to listen to his KWN interview from February.  His comments about NGD start around the 10:25 mark, but I recommend the whole interview.

http://kingworldnews.com/kingworldnews/Broadcast/Entries/2011/2/23_Pierr...

Here's the current corporate presentation:

http://http://www.newgold.com/Theme/NewGold/files/documents_presentation...

Bottom line for me is that there's no way I can walk away from this stock at current prices.  No Way.

Main Man seems to have some reservations about management here.  I'm all ears.  There does seems to be something of a checkered past, but the Black Fox Mine ​is up and running now, and that can't be denied.  They expect to be up to a steady state of 100,000 oz per year production by the end of the third quarter of this year.  Market cap is around $300 million, which seems to be a decent value for that kind of production.  Also on the plus side, the chart has been looking pretty decent.  Holding up pretty well in the face of the disaster in the mining sector.  Relative strength counts for a lot in my book.  BRD is +10% over the last month, while the GDXJ is -10%.

There's also the Goldfields Project in Saskatchewan.  A production decision is expected soon.  They are contemplating something like 70,000 oz per year, starting maybe 2013.

On the minus side, Sandstorm owns a 12% royalty stream on the Black Fox.  So you might as well mark Black Fox down from 100k to 88k production right off the top.  This kind of thing pisses me off.  While it's great for Sandstorm, I don't think it speaks well of Brigus' management that they would have ever done such a thing.

Back on the plus side, much of the best drilling lately is at the "147 Zone", just 4km away from the main mine, and ​outside ​of the clutches of Sandstorm.

One more on the minus side, their main corporate offices are in Halifax, Nova Scotia.  WTF?  How many serious miners do you know that have their offices in Nova Scotia?

Also on the minus side, there seems to be an awful lot of warrants out.  Fully diluted market cap is more like $420 million.

Here's their presentation:

http://www.brigusgold.com/pdf/2011-05-27%20AGM%20FINAL.pdf

Bottom line, I've got some mixed emotions here.  Any help out there?

I own both.  I didn't list Minera here because I consider it a silver miner, and this  thread is for gold miners.

Besides that, I view them as completely different kind of bets.

With ANV, the gold and silver ​is there.  ​The drilling is done.  ​The plan is in place.  It is largely an exercise in financing and construction at this point.

With Minera, we don't know for sure if there's something there of the size that you are hoping for.  You said it yourself when you said "if​ Minera were to find a large deposit near the Goldcorp site."  Sure, the odds seem good, but drilling is never a sure thing.

So, like I said, I own both, but for different reasons.

Any discussion of Minera Andes has to consider the impending merger with U.S. Gold.  Forum thread a few days ago:

http://www.tfmetalsreport.com/forum/merger-us-gold-minera-andes/111

I own UXG too.