The Northern Miner, first published in 1915, during the Cobalt Silver Rush, is considered Canada’s leading authority on the mining industry.
Rob McEwen, chairman and chief owner of McEwen Mining (TSX: MUX; NYSE: MUX), shared his thoughts recently with The Northern Miner about the outlook for the mining industry in 2014. McEwen Mining’s principal assets consist of the San José mine in Santa Cruz, Argentina (49% interest), the El Gallo 1 mine and El Gallo 2 project in Sinaloa, Mexico, the Gold Bar project in Nevada, U.S.A., and the Los Azules copper project in San Juan, Argentina. McEwen owns 25% of the company’s shares.
The Northern Miner: Some would say you are an eternal optimist. Are you optimistic about 2014?
McEwen: Anything can be better than 2013. On a relative value basis, gold is looking very attractive, compared to the broad market. So I think there might be some rotation into gold and gold shares … The producers are going through a lot of rationalization and cost cutting and they’ll be putting out some better numbers in the next few quarters.
And there are a few exploration companies that have put out fantastic drill results lately that have started to move their share prices up, like Reservoir Minerals and Balmoral Resources, and I think you’ll see a little bit more of that with the juniors.