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While copper and iron ore mining stocks were hammered as prices for the steelmaking ingredient and bellwether metal slide, gold attracted investors looking for safe havens this week.

The gold price is up a tidy US$30 an ounce since Friday’s close, touching US$1 782 on Tuesday and back to its third quarter opening levels.

In contrast to bullion’s relative buoyancy, gold mining stocks remain in a slump.

Newmont investors are nursing 14 percent losses quarter to date, Barrick is down double digits and AngloGold Ashanti is edging closer to 20 percent down.

A new chartbook released by Merk Investments, an investment advisor, and ASA Gold and Precious Metals, a closed-end investment fund established in 1958, includes two long-term charts that show gold mining stocks underperforming the price of gold is hardly a new phenomenon.

In fact, the current ratio between the metal and gold stocks as represented by the NYSE Arca Gold Mining Index, is not far off historic lows struck in 2015 and gold stocks have been underperforming gold for a decade.

If the price of gold stays stable at today’s levels, gold stock valuations would have to more than double to bring it in line with the historical average since the early 1990s.  — mining.com.