It was a quiet news day during Friday trading on the Canadian markets as investors bailed out of the gold stocks and went bargain hunting for undervalued base metal plays. For the tale of the tape, the TSX exchange rallied 3.16%, while the TSX Gold Index fell 2.9% and the TSX Venture Exchange, Canada’s largest junior exploration bourse, added 0.89% with the declining issuers inching past the advancers by a 444 to 419 margin on good volume of 169 million shares traded.

The payoff for investing in a sure thing is lower than usual these days—a 90-day T-bill only pays 1.8%.