Gold and Silver Blog

Durban Roodepoort Deep (NASDAQ: DROOY) announced today the issuance of a free call option on 10.2 million shares to South Africa's Investec Bank. There is some excellent analysis to be found at an article on Mineweb: DRD to end gold-swap nightmare.

The article suggests that DRD wishes to use the money from the new shares to buy out it's electricity hedge. That's what DRD means by "balance sheet restructuring."

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The Government of Zimbabwe is cracking down on illegal gold exportation (see Zimbabwe News Online: Illegal gold dealers to face the music).

It seems that entrepreneurial individuals have been panning for gold, and then selling it to illegal gold exporters, all without the proper taxes going to the government.

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Illegal gold mining is also an issue in Indonesia (see Asia Times: Illegal gold, coal mining costing Indonesia).

The capture of Saddam Hussein is blamed for the dip in gold prices (see CBS Marketwatch: Gold prices tumble on Saddam news). I personally see no reason why the capture of Saddam has anything to do with the price of gold.

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High gold and oil prices are benefitting Russia (see Moscow Times: Gold, Hard Currency Reserves Top $70Bln). Yet now they are worried about their currency getting too strong. The Ruble has risen 16% against the dollar this year, according to the article. But what currency hasn't risen against the dollar this year?