There are so many crappy mining companies and tickers out there that get SpecialFeatured™ on IKN that it's tough to keep count, but the ones on this list are the special ones, if you like. They all get ongoing coverage of their general nastiness and they all are the ones that get "really dude, don't go near this dog" slapped on them for very solid fundy reasons. They also vary in size from the scam explorarion start-ups like Affinity and Constitution to the middling/big producers like Gammon, Jaguar and Minfinders.
So here above is how they've got on so far this year, with the gold ETF (GLD there as our benchmark, too.
Top performer is Dorato Resources (DRI.v) that's actually put in a 17% profit this year and generally thumbed its nose at IKN. It'll still all end in tears, though....
Second comes GLD, just scraping above breakeven. Not very promising for the others, is it?
Third place is our old friend ECU Silver (ECU.to), a bronze that will surely warm the cockles of the pumpo paid promoter of this stock, 'Mexico Mike' Kachanovsky. Hey Mike, your owners are only 17% down so far this year. Getting better all the time, as in 2009 ECU lost 18%. Does this mean we can look forward to ECU.to only losing 16% in 2011? Time will tell.....
Fourth place is Minefinders (MFN), last featured here in August when its latest quarter was reviewed. MFN has actually managed to put on 3% or 4% since but has largely missed out on the sector's August rally and for good reason; it's a dog.
Fifth place is Gammon Gold (GRS) which has also seen extended coverage of its pisspoor results all year, including the way top management has been so darned lucky with the timing of insider sales.
Six is Jaguar Mining (JAG), the gold world's top proponent of OPUD. Its latest quarter was also so bad it was cause for derisive humour and we cut'n'diced in this post at the time.
Next in position seven is Constitution Mining (CMIN.ob), the epitome of Stone Soup. I'm actually surprised this one is still floating around the 70c range, what with owning nothing and having a silly number as its price/book value ratio to this day, but the year's performance is satisfactorily crap so far.
Then we come to the real dog performers. Ecometals (EC.v) is in next to last place, is no less than 90% down on the year (that's Enron territory) and is the worst type of scumball scam imaginable. Crooks leading sheep with promises of great things and hiring paid pumpers to fill empty heads with dollar signs....as they've always done throughout the history of this awful company coming up with zero zip nada nothing.And let's not forget how the insiders quietly sold at the top and late filed their trades, too. Disgusting people.
But the worst of the Rogue's Gallery (or the best, depending on how you look at these things) is Affinity Gold (AFYG.ob) (AFYG.pk). First highlighted as the most obvious scam possible in December 2009, it's not even pretended to be a proper company since then. The controllers sold their worthless shares and then just let it drop.
So to sum up, in a year of bullishness over gold juniors, IKN has managed a seven-from-eight record of identifying and weeding out potential crap from your portfolios. DYODD, dude.
Disclosure: No position in any of the stocks mentioned and advice remains to "avoid" (i.e. just don't go near these dogs)