Lisa Wright

Business Reporter

Like most junior explorers, brothers Ian and Peter Brodie-Brown just can't make a living hunting for copper and zinc these days.

"We don't have any cash flow, so I'm not getting paid. Period," said Ian, CEO of Tribute Minerals Ltd., who is manning a booth to promote his struggling company at this week's Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada convention.

"All the companies you see here don't have any cash flow. All the money we raise is through public markets, but there's no money available for base metals," he said.

But since all that glisters is gold nowadays – it closed yesterday at $939 (U.S.) an ounce – the Brodie-Brown brothers are changing gears. They dusted off an old Red Lake bullion project they had on the back burner and are pouring all their energy into promoting it to investors at the Toronto conference, the biggest industry blast of the year.

"It's definitely tough times, being in base metals. The only financing out there is for gold, so that's the place to be," added Peter, Tribute's vice-president of investor relations.

The shares of their Toronto-based microcap company are trading at 2 cents, well off their 52-week high of 22 cents a share on the TSX Venture Exchange.

They aren't the only ones getting hammered by dying investor interest. The value of the top 100 junior mining companies listed on the exchange plunged by 77 per cent over a five-month period from last July to November, PricewaterhouseCoopers reported yesterday.

The consulting firm says the global financial crisis "shattered the junior mining industry in Canada and around the world."

From June 2007 to last June, the top 100 TSX Venture mining companies fell in value to $18.1 billion from $20.2 billion on June 30, 2007, a decline of 10 per cent over 12 months.

But by the end of last November, market capitalization of those companies had plummeted another $14 billion to $4.1 billion, PwC says.

Thanks to the strength of the gold price – which recently crossed the key $1,000 threshold again briefly – the TSX gold index has recovered nearly 90 per cent since the markets tanked.

Of course, long-time believer and Goldcorp founder Rob McEwen feels he's sitting pretty, investing in loads of physical gold and with his recent, eye-popping personal investment of $40 million in Minera Andes Inc., a junior gold and silver miner in Argentina. It's possibly the biggest one-man private placement the ailing resources sector has ever seen.

"Gold is a currency and it's a monetary metal as opposed to an industrial metal. It's the only thing that's going up," said McEwen, cheerfully hanging out at the booth for U.S. Gold Corp., his junior explorer hunting for gold in Nevada and Mexico.

"These are very strange times. I think everyone should have some exposure to gold and silver if they care about their retirement," he said, sticking to his prediction that the price will hit $2,000 an ounce by the end of next year.

The conference, which ends tomorrow, has logged 17,000 in attendance – well off the record 20,100 who attended last year.