James:
For six months we have witnessed a persistant erosion in the price of BGO, which was attributed largely to the depressed gold market. Anyone with experience in the mining game knew that the decline signified something more than the depressed price of gold.
During this decline in the gold price, BGO became more and more reclusive in providing information concerning their properties. The information that was released has proven to be much less than truthful. Example, in July, the company made a release stating that drilling on the Aldebarran properties was going to be suspended for four weeks to give the drillers a break from what had been a very hectic pace. In reality, this was a cecessation of all drill activities on the CC, the Amigos, Quebrada, etc, that was not going to resume anytime soon. At the same time BGO dismissed any questions of the disruption to the operations at the Refugio because of weather as immaterial and being directed by hysterical investors. They also made inference that the plant would incur only minor disruptions. The release of the third quarter report indicates the problems were much more severe. It is very obvious that BGO's actions during this period were self serving with little interest for the investor. Primarily, they were smarting over the defeat of the options package at the AGM in June. They were intent at ramming this package thru in September along with calling the outstanding convertibles. To accomplish this, they would be as oblique as possible with any comments on the developments of their properties. Whether NB or MRDI is right is not relevant. With the various scandals that have occurred this year particularly the Bre-x situation, the market trusts no one and has an attitude that even the best names can be bought. That absolute lack of candor concerning many issues by BGO this year has cast a pall over their entire operations and the markets now have the attitude of show me. To date this has not been done in a convincing manner, consequently, we have very depressed share prices that are not likely to improve anytime soon. I have brought BGO's integrity into question many times this year, and the consequences that would result if it can be shown that they had been cavalier with the truth. A mining company whose honesty becomes open to question is a company that bears a heavy stigma. Voila welcome to BGO, November, 1997.
Ken |
