Gold has had a pretty terrible few weeks: back in late February it spiked to $2050 and then hung around in the mid-$1900s until the end of April. Now it has been challenging $1800 from above and closed the week at $1847. Of course, in the context of being just $1200 for years ago the yellow metal has done well, but given all that money-printing and rampant inflation one might have expected more of late.
I can’t say I’ve followed the affairs of ASX-listed (and formerly of the AIM parish) Medusa Mining (ASX:MML) since it departed our shores. But on Monday – for anyone still holding – the company is changing its name to “Ten Sixty Four”, ticker X64. So apart from the silly new name, what’s going on?
That was a rip-roaring week! One might be tempted to suggest that equity markets do not know what they want: they were sliding ahead of the Fed’s rate decision in fear of a rate hike. When they got it (a half point rise) they went up. And when the dust settled they went down again. Gold and Bonds did much the same.
Standard-listed Panther Metals plc (PALM) released its full-year numbers to December 2021 last week, and this bank holiday morning we had drilling news from its 37%-owned sister company in Australia, Panther Metals Ltd (ASX:PNT).
I ask this in relation to sub-standard-listed BSF Enterprise (BSFA), whose last accounts – full-year to September 2021 – showed £359,868 of cash and cash equivalents, and net assets of £364,816 having reported a loss of £58,325 on no income, which would have been a loss of £110,669 but for a VAT reclaim. Perhaps, given it had no business at the time, it was worth £364,816. Or perhaps we should allow for more losses going forward and mark it at around £300,000.
We have reached the end of month 4 – how are my five slam-dunk sells of AIM-listed Barkby Group (BARK), Tern plc (TERN), Trafalgar Property (TRAF), URU Metals (URU and Standard-listed AIQ (AIQ) doing?
Everything is going down: shares, precious metals, bonds – it is all one way traffic south. The Nasdaq is now officially in a bear market, and has seen all of last year’s gains wiped out. The Dow is down from almost 37,000 at the turn of the year to 32,977 and all the US indexes slumped into yeserday’s close. But Bonds are also falling, and Gold had a poor week too – perhaps no surprise, given the general sell-off.
The Schroder UK Public Private Trust (SUPP) (formerly Woodford Patient Capital Trust, WPCT) announced its full year results for calendar 2021 on Thursday. The headline was that NAV was, after the company’s three-monthly recalculation with regard to its unlisted dross, 48.08p – strongly up from 35p at FY20. So good news?
That was quite a week – having started in risk-on mode, all the major indices were slapped down on Friday, US treasuries fell away yet again and gold and silver slumped as the week drew to a close. Gold ended the week at $1,932, down from $1,974 a week ago, having bounced off resistance at $2,000. Meanwhile the Dow closed down 2.8% on Friday, alongside a 2.6% drop on the Nasdaq and a 1.4% fall from the FTSE100. The 10-year US Treasuries closed the week on a yield of 2.9% whilst 2-year hit 2.67%. The reason for the end-of-week squall was the Fed.
Having posted my thoughts on sub-Standard-listed Pure Gold (PUR) - dual listed in Toronto (TSXV: PGM) - over the bank holiday weekend, today we had an update from the company. And it was not good - my conclusion at the weekend was that it was more a case of Fool’s Gold than Pure Gold and this morning I was totally vindicated. Is it time for an Ouzo already?
