Finacial Post: Gold earnings season as noisy as expected so far

The second quarter gold earnings were expected to be noisy, and they have not disappointed so far.

Writedowns, plummeting profits and a vast range of realized prices have been key themes in the reports. Most importantly, the miners are unveiling the cost and capital spending reductions they merely hinted at for most of the year. They are a crucial step to preserve balance sheet strength amid a bear market for gold.

On Thursday, Goldcorp Inc. announced it is slashing spending by US$200-million in 2013, and reiterated mine closures are a possibility if gold sinks below US$1,200 an ounce for an extended period. It also cut exploration and general and administrative expenses. Rival Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. plans to cut more than US$200-million from next year’s budget.

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NBC News: Fort built by gold-hunting Spanish conquistadors discovered in N.C.

Before there was Jamestown and even before there was Roanoke, there was Spain's Fort San Juan, in the Appalachian foothills of North Carolina.

Archaeologists have uncovered the remains of the fort built by gold-hunting Spanish conquistadors in the 16th century and say it's the oldest European garrison ever found in the interior of the United States.

The settlement around Fort San Juan was occupied for less than two years and it met a rather bloody end — likely brought on by the Spaniards' botched bartering for food and their sexual transgressions with Native American women. But the short-lived fort's traces serve as a reminder of how different U.S. history might have been if Spain had been more successful in its early colonial campaigns.

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Wall Street Journal: Gold Smuggling Takes Off in India

NEW DELHI—A fishing boat slid into the southern Indian coastal village of Kodikkarai late one evening in mid-June, carrying a cargo from Sri Lanka: a stack of gold bars weighing more than 40 pounds.

Four men jumped off the boat and headed for waiting Jeeps. Unfortunately for them, government sleuths were there, tax officials say, nabbing the men before they could sell the gold in the nearby city of Chennai, a trading hub for the precious metal.

The men were charged with smuggling in a case that reflects a sharp upswing in illegal gold imports being reported by officials in recent weeks. The upturn follows the government's latest effort in June to rein in a drastic slide in the rupee's value by implementing policies to discourage importing of the precious metal. The rupee has fallen more than 10% in the past couple of months to touch successive record lows, closing Thursday at 59.11 rupees to the U.S dollar.

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Wall Street Journal: Australia's Gold Miners Struggle With Prices, Costs

SYDNEY—Australia's gold producers are struggling to deal with the dual blow from rising costs and falling prices, casting a shadow over earnings results that are due next month.

The latest production reports from Newcrest Mining Ltd., Australia's largest listed gold miner, and the smaller OZ Minerals Ltd. Thursday pointed to higher costs and tighter margins—underscoring the challenge facing producers after gold's biggest quarterly drop in decades.

Gold prices have fallen more than 20% since the start of January amid expectations the U.S. would start to taper its program of monetary easing as its economy stabilizes, putting miners of the precious metal in difficulty.

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Market Watch: Gold prices step slightly higher; copper steady

LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) — Gold futures nudged higher Thursday after being yanked down by more than 1% the previous day on reinforced worries about monetary-stimulus tapering by the Federal Reserve.

Gold for August delivery /quotes/zigman/6585799 GCQ3 +0.11% picked up $3, or 0.2%, to $1,322.50 an ounce in electronic trade.

December gold /quotes/zigman/662680 GCZ3 +0.11% , also among the most-active contracts, picked up $2.70, or 0.2%, to $1,322.80 an ounce in electronic transactions.

Meanwhile, September copper futures /quotes/zigman/678448 HGU3 +0.03% remained at $3.18 a pound. Copper prices on Wednesday fell 0.6% in the wake of a lower-than-anticipated reading for July manufacturing activity in China, though they briefly turned higher during the session.

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Financial Post: Colombia’s illegal gold mines flourish in global rout

Colombia’s unlicensed gold miners are proving to be resilient to the steepest price drop in 16 years and government efforts to regulate their operations.

Investments by companies including AngloGold Ashanti Ltd. are being held back as ambiguous local regulations exacerbate the effects of the global gold slump. In contrast, informal operations in remote rivers and jungle areas are flourishing. The government acknowledges that the number of producers without licenses probably has risen from the last census in 2010-2011, when they accounted for 87% of all gold mines.

“The informal sector is booming as they have much lower overheads,” Trident Gold Corp. Chief Financial Officer Andrew Smith said in an interview from Medellin. “Their great advantage is that they can operate on a much smaller scale. For international companies, just being listed is a burden.”

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Economic Times: Gold import squeeze likely to drive small jewellers to grey market

KOLKATA: Jewellers are up in arms against the new 20-80 principle worked out by the Reserve Bank of India to curb gold imports.

While availability will come down in the market, there is an apprehension that a large section of small jewellers will have to rely on the grey market for the supply of gold to meet the local demand. Jewellers say the government should come out with stricter rules to stop the sale of gold coins and bars rather than issuing new strictures at short intervals to curb imports in a bid to check the widening current account deficit (CAD).

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