[Precious Metal] Silver Stocks

Silver Proof In the previous two articles we have talked about gold stocks and copper stocks. In the third article of the previous metal stocks we will take a look at another commodity - silver.

Here are the silver mining companies:

• Silver Wheaton Corp. (SLW): the Vancouver, Canada based silver mining company purchases silver mines in Mexico and Sweden. Silver Wheaton is the only public traded mining company with all of its revenue coming from silver production. The company is expected to have annual silver sales of about 15 million ounces and then to 20 million ounces by 2009. Since the stock begin listed in AMEX last July at $3.1 per share, it rose to as high as $11.75 per share in April, gaining almost 300% in less than a year, before the May and June sell-off pushed the stock back to $8.36 per share today. In early May the stock was moved from AMEX to NYSE in order to gain broader exposure yet the stock actually has been down since. As for 2005 the company has generated revenue of $70.9 million with income of $25.3 million.
• Hecla Mining Co. (HL): the Coeur Dalene, Idaho based company has mining operation of silver, gold, lead and zinc in United States, Venezuela and Mexico. After reaching multi-year low of 50 cents in December of 2000, the stock began to go north and is now trading at 850% since its low at $4.74 per share. For this year the company is expected to dig out 6 million ounes of silver. The average price of silver which is one of the most importanat number of the mining firm has increased to $9.69/ounce in the first quarter of 2006, up from $7/ounce in the same quarter of previous year. Although for 2005 the company got net loss of $26 million with shrinking revenue of $110 million, the first quarter of 2006 looks more promising as the company has already earned more than a third of last year revenue of $40 million while generating net income of $38 million.
• Coeur d'Alene Mines Corp. (CDE): the silver and gold mining company is also based in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho with mining properties in United States, Australia and Africa. For 2005 the company has dig out 13.7 million ounces of silver compared to 14.1 million ounces in the previous year. The total probable silver reserves that the company owns is about 221.4 million ounces as of December of 2005. Despite slight drop in production the company actually has generated more revenue in 2005 - abuot $172 million compared with $133 million in the previous year on rising silver price. However recent sell-off has wiped out all the gains for this year as the stock is now back at $4.39 per share but should be expected to rise again with price of silver probably won't go down sharply anytime soon.