Goldcorp (G)

Before appearing on BNN's Business Day AM with Amber Kanwar and Jon Erlichman today, we wrote up a note for the show covering some key trends in the market and how insiders are positioning themselves. The background note was fairly extensive and we couldn't possibly cover it all in 7 minutes on television. But, I thought it would be worth sending the material to our readers because it covers a lot of ground, focusing on both institutional and speculative situations in the market.

The replay of the interview is now on the BNN website. If you missed the interview, you can watch it here: http://www.bnn.ca/video/insider-trading-trends-in-canadian-heavyweights~...

For David Grenville (Gren) Thomas, the big score was the discovery of Diavik by his Aber Resources more than 20 years ago.

Thomas and his partners headed north and got to work in the early days of the staking rush following Chuck Fipke’s 1991 discovery of diamonds in the Northwest Territories. It took a few years, but in 1994 and 1995, Aber discovered the kimberlite pipes that became Diavik, Canada’s second diamond mine. Diavik, still producing, is a joint venture between 60% owner Rio Tinto (RIO*US) and Aber successor Dominion Diamond (DDC) (40%).

In a previous blog, we suggested we'd see a rally for miners into the end of September. Mining stocks did rise about 10% from the end of August until about Sept 22nd. Unfortunately for the bulls, heavily piled up short positions as evidenced through commitments of traders reports took their toll on gold, and the miners themselves were pulled under their support, toppling 18% to their recent lows.

While most in the mining industry lamented a bear market as tech boomed, Goldcorp (G) founder Rob McEwen adopted open-source innovation.

Sean Roosen wasted no time establishing a gold royalty powerhouse, Osisko Gold Royalties (OR), last year after selling his Osisko Mining and its Malartic gold mine in Quebec to a Yamana Gold (YRI)/Agnico Eagle (AEM) consortium for $3.9 billion.

The Osisko Gold Royalties chairman and CEO added another prize royalty with the friendly takeover of Quebec-focused Virginia Mines. That deal gave Osisko a 2-3.5% NSR on Goldcorp's Eleonore mine in Quebec, which recently went into commercial production.

As a former director, president and co-CEO of Goldman Sachs (GS*US), John Thornton had presumably developed a thick skin as well as a large wallet.

The uber-profitable U.S. investment bank - famously described as a "great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity" by Rolling Stone writer Matt Taibbi - has been a favourite target of critics on Wall Street and beyond even before the financial crisis shook the foundations of U.S. finance. (Thornton retired from Goldman in 2003.)