Shares on London's junior market were slightly off the pace in lunchtime trading, but faring better than their bigger brethren.
The FTSE Aim 100 was down eight points at 3,341 and the FTSE Aim All-Share was down a couple of points at 710, but both were making a better fist of things than the FTSE 100, which was down 81 points at 6,084, weighed down by weak mining and banking shares.
What goes up must come down, the old adage has it, and that was certainly the case for Landore Resources PLC (LON:LND) today, as it lost 41% of its value after seeing it share price triple yesterday on the back of a significant gold find in Ontario.
Today's hot rocket is Sareum Holdings Plc (LON:SAR), the specialist cancer drug discovery and development company, that shot up 56% to 1.125p as it revealed that the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has approved the Clinical Trial Applications (CTAs) for its CHK1 inhibitor drug candidate CCT245737.
The prospect of shareholder diluted at Vast Resources PLC (LON:VAST) has passed for the time being, as the miner has declined a second payment under a financing agreed earlier this year.
Shares zoomed up 47% to 0.36p.
Indian fashion firm Koovs PLC (LON:KOOV) scrubbed up well, adding 28% at 21.85p as it revealed it had reached £10mln in sales ahead of schedule.
DiamondCorp PLC (LON:DCP) sparkled after the company reported good demand for diamonds extracted from its Lace mine in South Africa.
The shares rose 9.7% to 8.5p.
Dual-listed Asiamet Resources Limited (LON:ARS, CVE:ARS) went the other way, shedding 0.7p at 3.38p as it announced the results of a preliminary economic assessment of Beruang Kanan Main copper deposit in Kalimantan, Indonesia.
Payback will be less than two and a half years, even at today's soft copper price.
Sector peer Alecto Minerals (LON:ALO), the Africa-focused exploration and development company, fell 10% to 0.10125p as Paternoster Resources served notice to convert $495,365 of loan notes into 433.5mln Alecto shares at a conversion price of 0.08p a share.