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by Stockwatch Business Reporter

New York spot gold fell $9.10 to $1,223.60 on Friday. The TSX Venture Exchange gained 3.75 points to 538.06 while the TSX Gold Index lost 6.53 points to 176.95. Canadian gold miners retreated today, led by Goldcorp Inc. (G), which slumped $2.81 to $18.73 on 23.68 million shares on word the company lost $4.15-billion (U.S.) last year, all because of impairment charges and currency fluctuations.

Jean Lamarre and Benoit Desormeaux's Semafo Inc. (SMF) lost three cents to $4.79 on 3.82 million shares on word of a "positive feasibility study" of its Natougou gold project in Burkina Faso. (Promoters seldom deem their studies anything but positive; investors are a more skeptical lot.) This study is based on a mining reserve of 9.6 million tonnes averaging 4.15 grams of gold per tonne, a total of 1.28 million ounces. The study credits Natougou with a discounted net present value of $262-million (U.S.) after taxes and a mine life of more than seven years. How many more years will depend on the results of continuing exploration. The property saw little work beyond the immediate deposit area and Mr. Desormeaux, president and chief executive officer, considers the area within and beyond the deposit to have "significant upside potential."

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