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Abitibi Greenstone Belt

Gold Fields deal gives Osisko option to fast-track high-grade gold at Windfall – by Colin McClelland (Northern Miner – May 8, 2023)

https://www.northernminer.com/

The Windfall gold project in Quebec, boosted last week by a $600-million investment by Gold Fields (NYSE: GFI; JSE: GFI), may tweak plans to increase first-year production by a third, founding partner Osisko Mining (TSX: OSK) says.

The equal partnership would extend the undergound project’s ramp currently planned to run 630 metres deep to 800 metres instead, accessing ore grading about 9.1 grams gold per tonne rather than 8.1 grams, which could lift annual output to 400,000 oz. in contrast to 306,000 oz. in last year’s feasibility study, chairman and CEO John Burzynski said in a phone interview.

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Gold Fields inks joint development agreement with Canadian miner Osisko – by Marleny Arnoldi (MiningWeekly – May 2, 2023)

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Diversified gold producer Gold Fields has partnered with TSX-listed Osisko Mining to develop and mine the Windfall project, in Québec, Canada. The agreement between the companies, with the joint venture (JV) to be called the Windfall Mining Group, involves Gold Fields acquiring a 50% interest in Windfall through a wholly-owned Canadian subsidiary.

Gold Fields has paid a $220-million, or C$300-million, cash consideration on signing, and will pay another $220-million on the issuance of key permits by the Canadian authorities for the project to be built and operated.

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Timmins’ newest gold mine started operations Easter Monday – by Nicole Stoffman (Timmins Daily Press – April 18, 2023)

https://www.timminspress.com/

Gowest seeking local diamond drillers for exploration planned for later this spring

Gowest Gold’s Bradshaw Mine, 42 kilometres north of Timmins, began operations on April 10. The company’s president Dan Gagnon shared the news at a luncheon hosted by the Timmins Chamber at the Porcupine Dante Club on Tuesday.

“We are the new mine in Timmins,” said Gagnon, adding that the mine will produce 200 tonnes of gold ore a day (from which gold is extracted) this year at 5.6 grams of gold per tonne of ore, and ramp up to 1,300 tonnes a day by its third year.

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Agnico Eagle raising the gold production bar in the Abitibi – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – February 21, 2023)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Mine expansion at Detour Lake and Kirkland Lake figure prominently in gold production plans

There are more ounces to be pulled from the Abitibi gold belt, says Agnico Eagle. The Toronto gold company maintains it can produce more than two million ounces out of this region of northeastern Ontario and western Quebec by 2025, an area where Agnico got its start in the late 1950s. Agnico has five mines within this 32,000-square-kilometre area.

In a Feb. 17 conference call with analysts, Agnico management said it believes 2023 is an exciting year to advance a pipeline of projects and start to expand production at its existing operations while keeping production and total costs down to a low of $800 an ounce.

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Riding a 44% gain in its share price, Agnico’s first new CEO in 25 years is bullish on 2023 – by Gabriel Friedman (Financial Post – January 4, 2023)

https://financialpost.com/

‘I think 2023 really is going to be about optimizing the assets we have,’ says Ammar Al-Joundi

For the first time in almost 25 years, Toronto-based Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. — the largest gold miner inside Canada — will begin the year with a chief executive who isn’t named Sean Boyd.

Instead, Ammar Al-Joundi is the CEO while Boyd has moved into the role of executive chairman. Asked what lies ahead for Agnico and whether any big changes are planned, Al-Joundi relies on what could politely be characterized as boardroom jargon.

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Canada’s largest gold mine, an open pit in northern Ont., looks to expand underground – by Sergio Arangio (CTV News Northern Ontario – December 8, 2022)

https://northernontario.ctvnews.ca/

In one of the company’s first public addresses since merging with Kirkland Lake Gold in February and becoming the third-largest gold miner in the world (ranked by Canadian Mining Journal for the first half of 2022), Andre Leite, Agnico Eagle’s Ontario vice-president, said he sees more growth potential in northeastern Ontario.

That’s what he told local stakeholders at the Timmins chamber’s State of Mining conference Wednesday afternoon, saying there’s potential to dramatically boost output at Canada’s largest gold mine: the Detour Lake open pit.

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Peter Marrone has few regrets as he prepares to exit Yamana Gold after a nearly 20-year run – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – November 17, 2022)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Peter Marrone has few regrets as he prepares to walk away from the big Canadian gold mining company he founded and is now poised to sell to a pair of Canadian precious metals companies.

Last week, Toronto-based Yamana YRI-T agreed to sell itself to Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. and Pan American Silver Corp. for US$4.8-billion. That offer topped an earlier and deeply unpopular bid by South African miner Gold Fields Ltd., which was originally worth US$6.7-billion.

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Gold Fields ends effort to acquire Canada’s Yamana, which has backed Agnico Eagle-Pan American takeover bid – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – November 9, 2022)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

South Africa’s Gold Fields Ltd. has ended its flawed attempt to acquire Toronto-based Yamana Gold Inc., handing victory to Canadian precious metals miners Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. and Pan American Silver Corp.

In late May, Johannesburg-based Gold Fields proposed buying Yamana for US$6.7-billion in stock, a 42-per-cent premium to Yamana’s market price. The deal was poorly received, with Gold Fields shares losing as much as 40 per cent in the months that followed, and two of its biggest shareholders, VanEck and RWC Partners Ltd. (known as Redwheel), denounced the deal as making no sense strategically.

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The bulldozer versus the diplomat: Inside the power struggle at Agnico Eagle that led to the exit of CEO Tony Makuch after 16 days – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – March 4, 2022)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

A power struggle at Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. over corporate culture, personnel and strategy led to the big Canadian gold miner cutting ties with its new chief executive officer, Tony Makuch, only 16 days after he took over the job following a merger with his former employer, Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd.

Mr. Makuch’s hard-driving, bulldozer management style repeatedly bumped up against the hands-off, diplomatic approach of Agnico’s executive chairman, Sean Boyd, according to seven sources familiar with the situation.

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Exploration roundup: High gold prices continue to spur exploration activity around Kirkland Lake – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – February 22, 2022)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

A slew of junior miners are taking the plunge in the Abitibi Greenstone Belt

The Kirkland Lake mining scene has been reshaped with Agnico Eagle acquiring Kirkland Lake Gold and the Macassa Mine.

But a number of ambitious junior miners continue to search for high-grade gold at depth on the path to bring the next generation of mines online in this historic northeastern Ontario gold camp. The gold price in late February was hovering just below US$1,900 an ounce.

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Agnico Eagle and Kirkland Lake Gold seal the deal – by Staff (Northern Ontario Business – February 9, 2022)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Mining companies consummate $13.4B transaction announced last September

The “merger of equals” between Agnico Eagle and Kirkland Lake Gold is done. The two mining companies made that official in a Feb. 8 news release. The new and combined company will be called Agnico Eagle Mines Limited.

The two companies, which announced the $13.4-billion transaction back on Sept. 28, cleared the final regulatory hurdle for the combination to take place when Australia’s Foreign Investment Review Board approved the deal. Shareholders for both companies approved the transaction in November.

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Agnico Eagle and Kirkland Lake Gold merger likely the last major deal in Canada – by Trish Saywell (Northern Miner – October 4, 2021)

Global mining news

The mega-merger of Agnico Eagle Mines (TSX: AEM; NYSE: AEM) and Kirkland Lake Gold (TSX: KL; NYSE: KL; ASX: KLA) unveiled to the market on September 28 “makes a lot of strategic sense” but is likely to be the last blockbuster M&A deal by a major in the Canadian mining sector, according to Haywood Securities mining analyst Kerry Smith.

“Most of the big deals are done,” Smith says in an interview. “There are going to be acquisitions of assets by some of the mid-tiers—that’s what’s going to come next. I think we’ll see mid-tier mining companies buying single-asset development stage companies; companies like Rupert Resources, Moneta, and Belo Sun Mining and others — companies that are in super-easy jurisdictions to work in.”

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M&A heats up in a deeply oversold mining sector – by David Erfle (Kitco News – October 1, 2021)

https://www.kitco.com/

In a sector where investor confidence is extremely low, mining companies re-kindled efforts to explore alliances and partnerships to bring promising projects online and share the risk between parties during the recently concluded in-person Colorado mining conferences.

On Tuesday, global miners Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd (AEM) and Kirkland Lake Gold (KL) announced that they have agreed on a merger of equals, with the combined company to continue under the former’s name.

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Gold miners Agnico Eagle, Kirkland Lake propose $13.5 billion mega-merger – by Gabriel Friedman (Financial Post – September 29, 2021)

https://financialpost.com/

Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. and Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd., largest and second-largest gold producers in Canada, on Tuesday announced an all-stock merger, valued at around $13.5 billion that creates a new gold mining giant with its center of gravity in Canada.

The merged entity would keep the Agnico Eagle name and produce about 2.5 of its 3.4 million ounces of gold per year from mines in Canada. The deal comes about one year after gold, a traditional safe haven in times of economic uncertainty, reached an all-time peak at US$2,067 per ounce in August 2020.

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Agnico Eagle deal to buy Kirkland Lake Gold criticized – by Niall McGee and Andrew Willis (Globe and Mail – September 29, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. plans to acquire Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd. in an all-stock transaction that the companies say will create a “true Canadian mining champion,” but the deal garnered a lukewarm reception on Bay Street, with some investors questioning the strategic rationale.

Toronto-based Agnico said on Tuesday it intends to pay 0.7935 of its shares for each Kirkland share, or about 1 per cent higher than Kirkland’s average close over the 10-day period as of last Friday, essentially making it a nil-premium deal valued at more than $13-billion.

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