CARSON CITY -- Nevada mining analysts say they are not yet worried about the rapid decline in the sale price of gold and other precious metals over the past month.

Gold prices climbed $11.50 to close at $578 an ounce on New York markets Friday. But the price is about 20 percent less than the $730 per ounce price on May 10, which was a 25-year high.

Silver rose 16 cents Friday to close at $10.11 per ounce, but well below its $14.94 per ounce high on May 12. Copper closed at $3.22 per pound Friday, up 9 cents for the day, but off from its $4 high last month.

Nevada mines produce about two-thirds of the gold in the United States and are among the top copper and silver producers.

Russ Fields, president of the Nevada Mining Association, said that as long as the price stays above $500 per ounce for gold, Nevada mining companies will be happy.

"If it drops to the four hundreds there will be some concern," he added. "But I would say it is still a great period."

He noted exploration is booming in Nevada and that it generally takes more than five years to develop and open a new mine.

"Hundreds of millions of dollars is being spent on exploration and development," added John Dobra, a University of Nevada, Reno, professor who has been a longtime mining analyst. "Barrick built a power plant so it could ship power to its mines. Newmont has a power plant under construction."

Dobra said there are many factors that have caused the recent dip in gold prices. Gold tends to increase in value when the value of the dollar drops and the stock market is down.

He said the rise in price of oil to $70 per barrel drove up gold prices. Much of the world's gold supply is purchased by oil magnates in the Middle East, and the demand for gold has increased in India and China.

"These people have money and put it in gold," Dobra said. "That was driving up the demand for gold. Now some of the air is being let out of the stock market and some people are going for dollars."

Gold today still fetches a lot more than the $450 per ounce sale price last July, and the $275 per ounce bottom-out price early in 1999.

But both Dobra and Fields said the cost of producing an ounce of gold has jumped because of increases in the cost of electricity, fuel, steel and concrete.

The power plants were needed because mining uses about 25 percent of the electricity in Northern Nevada, according to Dobra.

The cost of producing an ounce of gold depends on the individual mines, according to Fields.

Mines where gold production costs were $200 to $300 an ounce a few years ago, now cost $300 to $400 an ounce, he said.

"The basic thing people ought to understand is mining is a risky business and it always has been," Dobra said. "Betting your children's education on the price of gold ... well, you might as well go to a roulette wheel."