Rago,

59 years...you are indeed an extremely patient man. Congrats!

Kidding aside, yes the clock is ticking for me as well. At times, I had some urge to bite the bullet, liquidate the holding, and move on, hoping that it can fit in with the year-end-for tax-loss sell strategy. But, I held my nose and gave the "new management" a chance to prove itself, considering the excellent holdings and the market severe undervaluation. Now, let's hope for no interference form the Chairman and the VP Exploration's willingness to take direction from the ship captain.

I found the passage below (from Michael Berry) quite interesting and could be useful for our company as well, although the comments are better suited for a company in the graphite sector.

http://www.theaureport.com/pub/na/14771

TGR: In picking mineral stocks, what is the most important fundamental factor?

MB: It depends where you are in the economic cycle, but almost always, management, management, management—is the most important factor. A great management team can create value in a mediocre project. A lousy management team—there are a lot of them out there—can destroy value in a great project by diluting recklessly, by wasting money on overhead, by chasing the flavor of the day, by giving $0.05 stock to friends and family and by too much diversification with properties. So management expertise and track record are almost always the most important factors.

For FNC, there would be no need to chase any additional drilling at the non-core holdings (may be interesting activities, but it would result in too much diversification). This is wasting money and effort which should be spent on developing the core assets. We have enough excellent holdings in our hands to focus on. Examples are Magpie and Lamelee. Let's focus on them and make some money for the shareholders.

goldhunter