BullMarketRun.ca

Check the comments section throughout the day for updates and helpful information. BMR Morning Market Musings resumes tomorrow.

1. Gold has traded between $1,262 and $1,274 so far today…as of 7:00 am Pacific, bullion is up $2 an ounce at $1,271…Silver has eased off 4 pennies to $16.77…Copper and Nickel are both down slightly at $2.86 and $4.59, respectively…Crude Oil, after a strong push in recent days, has retreated 60 cents to $49.57 while the U.S. Dollar Index is flat at 92.92…over the last 2 decades, August has been Gold’s 4th-best month with an average return of 1.5% according to BMR historical charts…the metal has recorded a winning August two-thirds of the time over the last 20 years, virtually the same winning percentage the Venture has enjoyed for August…

2. A private gauge of China’s factory activity rose for a 2nd straight month in July and hit its highest level in 4 months, indicating a faster pace of expansion despite official data showing renewed weakness in production and demand…the Caixin China manufacturing PMI rose to 51.1 in July from 50.4 in June…the Caixin reading comes after China’s official manufacturing PMI, a competing government gauge, slipped to 51.4 in July from 51.7 in June, dragged down by slower production and weaker demand, according to National Bureau of Statistics data released yesterday…metal prices aren’t reflecting this but many economists expect China’s economy to slow in the 2nd half of the year as government measures to rein in a hot property market and rising corporate debt start to weigh more on business sentiment and economic activity…

3. U.S. consumer spending barely rose in June as income failed to increase for the first time in 7 months, pointing to a moderate pace of growth in consumption in the 3rd quarter…the Commerce Department reported this morning that consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of U.S. economic activity, edged up 0.1% in June after an upwardly revised 0.2% gain in May…the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index, excluding food and energy, rose 0.1% in June after a similar gain in May…in the 12 months through June, the so-called core PCE price index increased 1.5%…the core PCE is the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure but it stubbornly remains below the central bank’s 2% target…

4. Investors will be looking ahead to the U.S. non-farm payrolls data later this week and how that may impact the dollar, positively or negatively…there is strong technical support on the Dollar Index, at least temporarily, at 93…the greenback turned red midday yesterday following news that President Trump’s communications director, Anthony Scaramucci, would leave the administration after less than 2 weeks on the job, but news of Scaramucci’s ouster actually should have propelled the dollar higher…he was arguably President Trump’s worst hire but new Chief of Staff John Kelly is unquestionably one of the President’s best…Kelly, a highly respected four-star-general who excelled during his brief tenure as Secretary of Homeland Security, will bring military-style discipline to the White House and a more effective strategy in dealing with an obstructionist Congress…also, at a time of heightened global tensions, especially the situation in North Korea, there’s no one better than Kelly as Chief of Staff…the fact he canned Scaramucci, and had him escorted out the door, shows that Trump has given the general the full authority he needs to succeed in his position (hopefully that continues)…Democrats, the mainstream media and other anti-Trumpers have been quick to point out that the last four-star-general who was appointed Chief of Staff was Alexander Haig in 1973 during the embattled Nixon Presidency…

5. The 3 major U.S. indexes notched multiple record highs last month and have started August in the same fashion as Wall Street continues to react positively to strong quarterly earnings reports…the Dow is up 58 points through the first 30 minutes of trading and came within just 2 points of 22,000…three-quarters of the S&P 500 companies that had reported as of Friday had exceeded estimates on both the top and bottom lines, according to data from FactSet…interesting article headlining the Financial Post this morning – “In Search of the Motherlode: Why Yukon is Experiencing a 21st Century Gold Rush“…soon they’ll be writing about a big Nickel-Copper find in the middle of a high-grade Gold Camp at Eskay Creek…the Venture is off 2 points at 769 as of 7:00 am Pacific as the Index continues to deal with a band of resistance between 770 and 778 – once that is cleared, the next key area is the high 780’s…

6. Osisko Mining (OSK, TSX) reported significant new assays this morning from 35 intercepts in 22 drill holes focused on infill and expansion drilling in the Underdog, Caribou and Zone 27 corridors at its Windfall Lake Project in Quebec where a 400,000-m program continues…OSK-OBM-16–609 intersected 63.2 g/t Au over 7.7 m (23.7 g/t Au over 7.7 m cut) including 18.9 g/t Au over 2.0 m and 222 g/t Au over 2.0 m…mineralization in that hole consisted of several bands with 20% pyrite with traces of chalcopyrite and sphalerite…Windfall Lake is currently one of the highest grade resource-stage Gold projects in Canada…the bulk of the mineralization occurs in the Main Zone, a southwest/northeast trending zone of stacked mineralized lenses, measuring approximately 600 m wide and at least 1,400 m long…the deposit is well defined from surface to a depth of 500 m, and remains open along strike and at depth…mineralization has been identified only 30 m from surface in some areas and as deep as 870 m in others, with significant potential to extend mineralization up and down-plunge and at depth…

7.  A 25,000-m drill program is now in progress at Orca Gold’s (ORG, TSX-V) Block 14 Gold Project in the Republic of the Sudan…drilling is aimed at expanding the current resource below the optimized pits set out in the recently revised PEA and will update the model to be used in the feasibility study that is scheduled for completion by the end of Q1 2018…the updated PEA is based on a mill throughput of 3.4 million tonnes per year, using a Gold price of $1,100 (U.S.) per ounce for mine design and $1,200 per ounce for economic analysis…in-pit mineral resources comprise 41 million tonnes grading 1.46 g/t for 1.9 million ounces in the Indicated category and 3.4 million tonnes grading 1.56 g/t for 173,000 ounces in the Inferred category…the project shows strong economics with an after-tax NPV (discounted at 7%) of $227.7-million (U.S.) and an IRR of 23.1%…ORG is unchanged at 41 cents as of 7:00 am Pacific…

The most popular recent BMR articles/videos…

Two Big Plays Emerge in B.C., Setting The Stage For A Summer To Remember

How To Bring A Junior Resource Market To Life!

The Dramatic New Chase For A Nickel-Copper-Rich Massive Sulphide Deposit In The Heart Of A Famous Gold Camp

Northern Ontario Cobalt Junior Attracts Interest From Metal Trading Companies

The Most Important Venture Development Since The New Bull Market Began

CSR Builds Momentum At Castle Mine