Charles Oliver, HBSc CFA

Gold. This has had a long base, and he keeps on thinking that we are about to break out to the upside, but we just now hit a low of just above $1,100. We should be hitting a summer rally just about now. He sees it at $1,600 a year from now. Last year people sold their golds, and are out of the sector. Have now seen stock market gains go up dramatically with it looking a little expensive, so he expects we will get new buyers coming back. One of the big issues is all the quantitative easing and printing of money. A lot of the money has stayed on the banks’ balance sheets, and hasn’t gotten into the economy. At some point he believes the banks will realize they are getting only 2% on their treasuries, and could get a bit higher return and start lending out to businesses, etc. When you get the money going into the system, your M2’s and M3’s start to kick in, and that’s when you could start to see inflation kicking up.

Silver. Absolutely loves this commodity. On a long term basis, this is going to outperform gold. About 66% is for industrial use, and industrial use has been good. But it also has a precious metals characteristic. Ratio of gold to silver historically has been on a ratio of 16 to 1. Right now we are at about 60 to 1, and he expects that ratio to come down. If gold was at $1,600, silver historically would be at $100, a 4 or 5 fold increase from where we are. He is expecting to see that. The last time we saw this was in 1980 when the gold price was around $800 and silver was at $50, a ratio of 16 to 1.

It was very nice to see the acquisition of Sulliden (SUE-T), because so many times you see gold companies making mergers just for the sake of getting bigger, rather than actually creating some real synergies. This has created a company that now has 2 key assets. They are within close vicinity and will have some benefits. Expects there will be increases in the multiple people are willing to pay.

Great management team. One issue he has always had is that it is very low grade, at 0.3 grams per ton. Last year they had some issues with some transition ore they were going through. When they were mining this, their recoveries were not as high as they had hoped. He would really like to see them with some higher grade projects.

Have one of the best management teams in the business. They are good builders of mines, good explorers, good developers and good operators. Within a gold fund, this is one of the core names you want to own. He likes to buy a company like this when they actually have some sort of miss, some sort of negative happening which impacts the stock.

One of his Top 10 holdings now. Thinks they are doing the right things. Tried to expand too fast and were cutting some corners. Brought in new management which seems to be doing the right things. Now getting into a bit of a sweet spot, their Siou mine which they are operating. On a long term basis, this mine is going to continue to operate well. Have a large land package, which ultimately they can continue to look forward to. If you want to own, Buy a little bit now and, if there is a pullback, add to it.

Went through a bit of a teething period, as many of these mines do. Cash costs were quite high. Have been able to bring them down in the last several quarters, and just came out with some good numbers. One of the concerns is that they are mining above grade at just over 5 grams per ton. If you see that grade come down, you’ll see a slight bump in the overall costs. Has had a nice run. Not the cheapest stock out there, but seem to be making a turn around right now in terms of getting things under control.

One of the best management teams out there. Instituted a 2.5% dividend. Very good at Buying cheap. Good miners and operators. However, he would love to see a mining company that has a marquee asset. Right now this has 3 decent projects, but doesn’t have that marquee that he is looking for. $1.35 would be quite reasonable.

(A Top Pick Sept 17/13. Down 37.05%.) Was almost thinking of adding it as a Top Pick again, but the timing wasn’t quite right. They are going in through a pocket of lower material now, so earnings and cash flow are not as high. Still have a lot of cash. Thinks they will continue to move forward and get their grades and production back up, but the market just doesn’t care.

(A Top Pick Sept 17/13. Down 28.99%.) A year ago this was a sort of defensive position. Had lots of cash on the balance sheet. One of their issues was that their costs were too high. They went through a bit of a turn around to bring down those costs. They haven’t brought down the costs enough. Looking at the sum of the parts, he would think there would be a number of companies that could come and buy up their assets, and break it up for the different assets.

(A Top Pick Sept 17/13. Up 41.63%.) Pays a wonderful dividend. Doesn’t have a lot of growth, which is one of its knocks. There are a couple of catalysts that could propel it. Everybody hates Argentina, and they have the Navidad asset there, one of the world’s largest undeveloped silver projects. 3.5% dividend.

The only diamond stock he owns. Has a great asset. You’ll have to wait 2 or 3 years before they are into production, 2017-2018. They are going to have a huge amount of cash flow. Very nice looking project. As they de-risk the project, you will see it rise. Have a government that seems to be clearly on side with the project moving forward.

In the last few years he has been focusing on high grades and safe jurisdictions. This one is a very high grade deposit. CapX is going to be about $100 million to get it on line. Feasibility and IRR numbers are absolutely spectacular on this project, so he very much likes it. Burkina Faso is a reasonably stable place, but he would suggest you diversify your risks by diversifying into different jurisdictions.

Has a good mine. The main focus by the company over the last couple of years has been on their smelter. They have one in Namibia, which they were required to upgrade a couple of years ago to make it more environmentally friendly. Sort of at the tail end of getting that up and running. Good management.

Good management which has created a very unique package of assets. Their big focus right now is Hard Rock in Ontario. Have a great team of people. There will be a lot of analysts’ reports coming out in the next month or two.