Gold prices have been on a tear and recently hit a 25-year high. How sustainable are current prices?
A: I see them as being relatively sustainable as we watch China and India and other countries increase their consumption and their needs as they try to bring up their standard of living and ramp into a developed-nation status.
We’ll continue to see this influence on the price of metals in general and certainly with gold. In different cultures around the world they still invest quite heavily in gold and jewelry as a way to bank their income or bank their savings.
Q: Who should consider gold as an investment and who should not?
A: As with any investment, that’s a personal choice, right? But I think that gold is a very strong focus at this point and it’s a good investment opportunity for most people. Now anybody who’s broke shouldn’t be doing it because you’re probably investing into your credit card (laughs). You know, you’ve got to be prudent.
Q: Would there be a concern for gold as an investment if we see a strengthening dollar, low inflation, debt reduction, or a lot of central bank gold sales – factors that might drive gold prices down?
A: Well they are certainly risk factors, you bet. But everything that I’ve seen on U.S. fundamentals is that we keep getting further and further in debt instead of out of it.
In looking at those (factors) you see that gold has a strength to it for at least another five years. That would be my estimation.
Q: You’ve been active in “sustainable mining” initiatives. How does that work? What do you do with a gold mine when it’s played out?
A: Mine infrastructure presents an opportunity to invite in another business, maybe renewable energy generation, wind power. At (one location) they’re considering a municipal waste facility, a landfill, that would be in the (mine) pit.
A lot of companies have been looking at these mine sites as assets. Maybe we can find other businesses that would like to come out and occupy these sites and generate another set of income, another revenue stream, for communities that rely so heavily on natural resources.
Q: Why are women so significantly underrepresented in the mining industry?
A: I don’t think they’re so much underrepresented. What I have seen lately is a lot of women who are beginning to advance into upper-management and directors’ positions that, because we’ve been in the industry for a long time and we’ve illustrated that we have the goods, we have the makeup to occupy these spots.
I’ve seen that a number of my peers, a number of gals are now in VP and president positions and directors and CEOs. It’s an increase. We don’t currently occupy a high percentage of that, but you do see the advancing numbers.
Q: How do you feel about the state of Montana and several counties in Colorado passing laws to ban the use of cyanide for gold extraction?
A: I think they’re ill-founded. Certainly in Montana – that’s my home state. And I’m quite sad to see the kind of confounded discussions with regard to cyanide and how emotionalized they can make a situation that is engineered to be contained and is in such low doses.
From my perspective, having been in both the operations and exploration for a good 25 years now, we can manage and mitigate these things quite well. Investment dollars don’t want to go into areas (with cyanide bans), therefore exploration and development don’t occur.
And therefore, like Montana is now … jeez, scraping the bottom of the barrel for one of the highest unemployments and some of the lowest pay scales. And what you see in Nevada instead is a very strong domestic mining industry with the subsequent benefits that go with that, including stronger communities that are hosting these mines because they have a diversified economy, and very high pay scales for these diversified jobs or opportunities inside the mining industry.
Q: You’re running Denver-based U.S. Gold from Reno. Does that present challenges?
A: Sure, it presents challenges but I have a very fine chief financial officer and VP of the company, Bill Pass, who’s in Denver and has been with the company quite a long time. He’s very able-bodied and he makes my job quite a bit easier.
The focus is to advance the exploration and development here in Nevada on our project and Bill can very aptly do all of the administrative functions out in the Denver office.
I’m just months into this but so far it’s running smoothly.
Q: What do you do when you’re not working?
A: Well, I’m an outdoorsy sort of gal so I spend most of my time outside, whether I’m on the job or not. My husband and I are avid skiers. We have an old Tucker 1955 Sno-Cat that we use periodically to access different areas so we can get some good backcountry skiing in.
Q: Are you wearing anything gold right now?
A: Yes sir, I have my wedding ring on. I’m a real jewelry aficionado, usually ethnic jewelry as I travel around the world. So I try to gather up bracelets, usually in silver. But I certainly have my gold band and other gold jewelry, earrings and whatnot that I’ve collected over time.
Some are special ones from my parents, you know how those traditions are … fathers like to give their little girls some jewelry, so I’ve collected those over time too.
Edited for space and clarity from an interview by staff writer Steve Raabe.
