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Barrick Gold Corporation

Barrick passed on acquiring Kirkland Lake because it didn’t see value – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – November 5, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Barrick Gold Corp. considered buying Kirkland Lake Gold Ltd. but says it ultimately passed because the big Canadian gold miner didn’t meet its standards for investment returns.

Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. in September reached a friendly agreement to acquire Kirkland Lake in an all-stock, no-premium acquisition worth more than $13-billion. The deal will see Toronto-based Agnico increase its footprint significantly in Canada and Australia, two of the most stable mining jurisdictions in the world.

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Bristow won’t “feed ducks quacking in the market” when quizzed on Barrick share price – by Brendan Ryan (MiningMX.com – October 8, 2021)

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BARRICK Gold would “ultimately prevail” because it was building a long-term, investable business for all its stakeholders and not just the few that were demanding “instant gratification”.

That’s according to Barrick CEO, Mark Bristow who was responding to a question at the Financial Times Mining Summit over why the Barrick share price was down 19% this year compared with only a 9% drop for Newmont Corporation.

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Barrick options South Uchi project from Kenorland Minerals – by Jackson Chen (Northern Miner – September 20, 2021)

Global mining news

Kenorland Minerals (TSXV: KLD) announced that it has entered into a property option agreement with Barrick Gold (TSX: ABX; NYSE: GOLD) with respect to the company’s South Uchi project in Ontario.

Under the option agreement, Barrick can earn an initial 70% interest in the project by spending a total of $6 million on mineral exploration within six years, of which $3 million are guaranteed expenditures within the first three years.

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Barrick eyes new mines, not deals, for future growth – by Ernest Scheyder (Yahoo/Reuters – September 13, 2021)

https://www.yahoo.com/

LAS VEGAS (Reuters) – Barrick Gold Corp Chief Executive Mark Bristow spent years burnishing his reputation as an aggressive dealmaker, but he says now he is focused on new mines that he hopes will boost profit and the company’s sagging stock price.

The strategy eschews the acquisition appetite that made Barrick what it is today and instead pins the company’s growth on exploration projects in Egypt, Nevada, Guyana and elsewhere.

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Barrick Gold’s CEO is stuck: He would love to acquire, but promised investors some discipline – by Tim Kiladze (Globe and Mail – August 10, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Two and a half years into his tenure as Barrick Gold Corp.’s chief executive, Mark Bristow is sticking to the party line, reassuring investors that miners have learned from past mistakes and will not overpay for deals.

“We blew our brains out over the last big bull market,” he said in an interview Monday. After enduring billions of dollars of writedowns and adding boatloads of debt, he has a new mantra for Barrick: “We’re not putting our balance sheet at risk.”

But Mr. Bristow is a conflicted man, because in almost the same breath he acknowledges that he would love for Barrick to get bigger. After all, this is a man who, without hesitation, publicly floated merging with giants Newmont Mining and Freeport-McMoRan in the past, only to be rebuffed.

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Barrick says Goldrush ‘world-class’ – by Adella Harding (Elko Daily Free Press – August 9, 2021)

https://elkodaily.com/

Along with announcing an increase in adjusted net income in the second quarter, Barrick Gold Corp. on Monday reported an updated feasibility study of the Goldrush exploration project in Nevada confirmed Goldrush is a world-class asset.

The company also reported that a record of decision on Goldrush from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management is now anticipated in the fourth quarter of next year.

Catherine Raw, chief operating officer for North America, said in a earnings webinar that the permitting for Goldrush has been a “long time coming” and takes in many issues but the “decline exploration allows us to ramp up quickly,” once there is a record of decision.

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Egyptian government, Canadian company sign 4 contracts for gold exploration (Daily News Egypt – July 28, 2021)

https://dailynewsegypt.com/

The Egyptian Mineral Resources Authority (EMRA) and the Canadian company, Barrick Gold Corporation, have signed four contracts related to gold exploration in the Egyptian territories.

The Canadian company is the largest gold production company of its kind in the world, and is ranked second globally in the activity of gold search.

The contracts were signed by EMRA head Khaled El-Sheshtawy and Joel Holiday, Vice President of Barrick Gold, who signed via videoconference. Tarek El Molla, Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, was present to witness the signing of the contracts.

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Barrick working with new DRC govt on outstanding legal, fiscal issues – by Tasneem Bulbulia (Mining Weekly.com – July 12, 2021)

https://www.miningweekly.com/

Gold miner Barrick Gold is strengthening ties with the recently appointed government in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and is working towards an “amicable solution of some outstanding legal and fiscal issues”, CEO Mark Bristow has said.

Briefing the media about developments at the Kibali mine, in the DRC, and the Tongon mine, in Côte d’Ivoire, at the weekend, he said Barrick’s success in building and operating the Kibali mine in a remote part of the DRC was attributable to the mutually beneficial partnerships it had forged with its in-country stakeholders – the central, provincial and local governments; its host community; civil society; and a large corps of highly competent contractors and suppliers.

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Barrick M&A leads to greenhouse gas emissions jump – Metals Focus – by Vladimir Basov (Kitco News – July 7, 2021)

https://www.kitco.com/

(Kitco News) – Barrick Gold’s corporate restructuring has led to a jump in greenhouse gas emissions, according to Metals Focus, a leading independent precious metals research consultancy, which today presented findings of its annual peer group ESG report comparing ESG metrics across 16 of the biggest gold miners over the last seven years.

Metals Focus said that this report, the latest of which comes out this week, aims to make like-for-like comparisons across this peer group, although this is not possible for all metrics because of the variability in disclosure.

However, Metals Focus noted that comparing these companies from a high level does offer some useful perspectives.

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[Nevada Mining] One ore body, once divided – by Suzanne Featherston (Elko Daily Free Press – June 14, 2021)

https://elkodaily.com/

The gold mining operation at Carlin is the largest in the world, with a massive ore body that has yielded millions of ounces of gold over its more than 60-year history in northeastern Nevada.

Up until recent history, the Carlin Trend was mainly divided between two senior gold mining companies — Barrick Gold Corp. and Newmont Corp. On the surface, that meant fences separated properties. Underground, boundaries took the form of vertical walls.

Practically, neither company had a full understanding of how the ore body behaves from beginning to end. Sometimes the same geologic feature had different names depending on what side of the line it fell on.

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Barrick CEO blasts ‘hysterical’ fund managers chasing quick cash – by James Attwood (Bloomberg News – May 5, 2021)

https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/

Investors are undermining the gold industry’s ability to grow by demanding a bigger share of profits from high bullion prices, according to the CEO of the world’s second-largest producer.

“Fund managers just bash the table and want money — they’re not interested in this industry reinforcing its foundations,” Barrick Gold Corp. Chief Executive Officer Mark Bristow said in an interview Wednesday. “Then they turn around and get hysterical when a host country demands returns.”

While Toronto-based Barrick is returning a sizable chunk of earnings and divestment proceeds to shareholders, Bristow urged fund mangers to take a longer-term approach to generating returns for their customers.

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Barrick CEO Mark Bristow opens door to merger with great rival Newmont – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – May 6, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Mark Bristow, Barrick Gold Corp.’s chief executive officer, is ruing a lost opportunity to buy a large United States copper miner at a bargain basement price, and is now opening the door to a merger with great rival Newmont Corp.

Just more than a year ago, when the price of copper was in the pits, Mr. Bristow openly pondered a friendly deal with Freeport-McMoRan Inc. Had the transaction happened, Mr. Bristow may well have been hailed as a genius, because in the interim Freeport’s shares have gone up nearly fourfold.

Copper this year has marched to a near record high thanks in part to rebounding demand in China, and speculative demand from traders.

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Barrick matches Newmont’s emissions reduction target – by Ngaire McDiarmid (Mining Journal – April 14, 2021)

https://www.mining-journal.com/

It follows fellow gold major Newmont announcing in November “industry-leading climate targets of 30% reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2030, with an ultimate goal of achieving net zero carbon emissions by 2050”.

Barrick unveiled its 2020 sustainability report last week and president and CEO Mark Bristow conducted a virtual presentation to investors yesterday on sustainability, which the miner said was “the first of its kind for Barrick”.

“A standout achievement has been our progress with regards to climate change,” Bristow said during the presentation.

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Barrick Gold lost its ‘social licence’ in Papua New Guinea. This is the price it’s paying to earn it back – by Gabriel Friedman (Financial Post – April 15, 2021)

https://financialpost.com/

Mining executives often talk about the importance of having a ‘social licence’ to operate, yet it’s rare to hear them acknowledge when they don’t have one.

Barrick Gold Corp.’s chief executive Mark Bristow says it happened to his company in Papua New Guinea, where its Porgera mine had been pumping out gold for nearly three decades, even as a spate of accusations about human rights and environmental abuses in the surrounding communities have festered.

Ultimately, last April, Barrick was forced to put the mine on care and maintenance, essentially ceasing operations, when the government declined to renew its permit. Since then, Bristow has made countless trips to the island nation to meet with Prime Minister James Marape, including four since December.

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Profit-sharing deal with Barrick gives Papua New Guinea majority stake in Porgera gold mine – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – April 10, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Barrick Gold Corp. has hammered out a new profit-sharing agreement with the Papua New Guinea (PNG) government for its Porgera gold mine in which it makes major concessions in return for being able to restart operations after a year-long shutdown.

Under the pact announced on Friday, PNG’s ownership in Porgera will rise to 51 per cent from 5 per cent. Barrick and China’s Zijin Mining Group Ltd., which previously owned a combined 95 per cent stake, will see their shares fall to a combined 49 per cent. Toronto-based Barrick, the operator of the mine, will front the entire cost of reopening the site.

John Ing, analyst with Maison Placements Canada Inc., said while the new ownership agreement appears “draconian” at first sight for Barrick, being able to reopen the mine again at a time when the price of gold is elevated is a big positive.

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