UPDATE 2-Barrick to sell part of its stake in African Barrick – by Euan Rocha (Reuters U.S. – March 10, 2014)

http://www.reuters.com/

(Reuters) – Barrick Gold Corp said on Monday it plans to sell about 13.5 percent of its holdings in its majority-owned subsidiary African Barrick Gold .

Toronto-based Barrick, which currently owns a roughly 303.25 million shares in African Barrick, is selling 41 million shares. The gold miner will still own a majority stake of just over 60 percent in the Africa-focused miner following the close of the transaction.

Barclays analyst Farooq Hamed believes the stake sale will result in proceeds of just over $200 million that will help bolster the gold miner’s balance sheet and allow it to trim its debt load.

The move is the latest attempt by the world’s largest gold miner to trim its asset base and reduce its exposure to higher cost assets. In 2012, the company attempted to sell a part, or all of its interest in African Barrick Gold to China National Gold Group, but those talks fell apart last year.

The company has since gone on to sell a number of non-core assets. In January, Barrick Gold agreed to sell its Kanowna gold mine in Western Australia to Northern Star Resources for A$75 million.

Last August, the company said it has agreed to sell its Granny Smith, Lawlers and Darlot gold mines in Western Australia to Gold Fields for $300 million.

The sale of the 41 million African Barrick shares represents about 10 percent of the company’s outstanding share base.

The shares will be sold to institutional investors and Barrick has appointed UBS Ltd, J.P. Morgan Securities and RBC Europe Ltd to act as joint book runners in relation to the deal.

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