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Barrick Gold Corporation

COMMENT: Who is anonymous and why is he saying all these nasty things? [African Barrick] – by Marilyn Scales (Canadian Mining Journal – June 19, 2014)

Marilyn Scales is a field editor for the Canadian Mining Journal, Canada’s first mining publication. She is one of Canada’s most senior mining commentators.

The story broke in the June 18 issue of the Wall Street Journal that African Barrick has been accused of paying bribes to officials of the Tanzanian government to facilitate the company’s purchase of land near the North Mara gold mine.

The problem is that the accusation was made anonymously. Why does this person or persons want to hide their identity?

Several explanations come to mind. The accusers may fear reprisals for blowing the whistle. They may not have supporting evidence. They may want to defame African Barrick for a personal reason. They may be hoping to stir up trouble with local communities. Sending the accusations to the US Justice Department and US Securities and Exchange commission, as the accusers did, is a clear attempt to stir up legal trouble.

Making anonymous accusations is cowardly. If the accusations are true, the accuser should stand behind his opinion and offer proof. Not doing might weaken the case, except there are far too many people willing to think the worst of a foreign company in a poor country.

The very idea of an anonymous accusation goes against this writer’s sense of fair play.

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Gold Miners Feel Lucky in Search for Nevada Buried Riches – by Liezel Hill (Bloomberg News – June 18, 2014)

http://www.businessweek.com/

It’s not just gamblers, celebrity chefs and brides-to-be that find Nevada irresistible. About 400 miles north of the Las Vegas strip, the world’s two biggest gold producers are doing some prospecting too.

Even after more than a century and a half of exploration, Barrick Gold Corp. (ABX) and Newmont Mining Corp. (NEM:US) say there’s plenty of hidden gold still to be uncovered in Nevada, which already accounts for a third of their output and produces more of the metal than South Africa and Chile combined. The miners are refining exploration techniques, while looking deeper and in areas they’d previously dismissed to find new resources.

“In a lot of ways, even as mature as northern Nevada is, it’s still young from a discovery standpoint,” said Doug Livermore, Newmont’s regional project director for North America. The state accounts for more than 6 percent of global gold production.

With the 28 percent drop in gold prices last year forcing miners to look for lower-cost ways to increase output and cut exploration budgets, companies such as Barrick and Newmont are focusing more on existing holdings. Nevada’s deposits also offer lower investment risk than mines in less politically stable regions of the world.

One of the two potential new mines that Greenwood Village, Colorado-based Newmont is considering is in Nevada.

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China’s largest gold miner looks to partner with Barrick, Newmont – by Rachelle Younglai (Globe and Mail – June 18, 2014)

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

China’s state-owned gold mining company is working on potential partnerships with both Barrick Gold Corp. and Newmont Mining Corp., its president said on Tuesday.

If the Asian company is successful, the alliances would bring one or both of the Western miners closer to China, a country that is now the world’s largest consumer and producer of the yellow metal.

“Both sides are making an effort to co-operate in the future,” Xin Song, the president of China National Gold Group Corp., China’s largest gold producer, said in an interview.

For Toronto-based Barrick, the talks represent a step forward, one that could be the beginning of a long-lasting and meaningful union that Barrick’s new chairman John Thornton wants to establish with the Chinese.

When Mr. Thornton was an executive at Goldman Sachs, he started developing relationships with key Chinese policymakers. The investment banker was chosen by Barrick’s founder Peter Munk for his contacts in China to align Barrick more closely with the rapidly growing economy and to further his vision of turning Barrick into a major, diversified miner.

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Barrick reaches deal with indigenous groups over Pascua Lama mine – by Rachelle Younglai (Globe and Mail – May 29, 2014)

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Barrick Gold Corp. has struck a deal with the indigenous groups that opposed the company’s mothballed Pascua Lama project. But the miner must still overcome huge obstacles before it can resume developing the massive gold and silver deposit in the Andes.

The mountaintop project on the border between Chile and Argentina has been put on hold indefinitely while Toronto-based Barrick waits for market conditions to improve.

The company’s mismanagement of Pascua Lama pushed costs up to $8.5-billion as the gold market soured, forcing Barrick to halt construction late last year in order to conserve cash.

Although Barrick is nowhere close to restarting the South American project, the company said Wednesday that it had reached an initial agreement in April with 15 Diaguita communities in Chile.

Barrick said it will share technical and environmental information about Pascua Lama with the indigenous groups as well as provide funding for any independent analysis.

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Citigroup: Don’t be tempted to buy gold stocks – by David Berman (Globe and Mail – May 29, 2014)

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

After getting slaughtered last year, gold mining stocks are showing modest gains in 2014 and are also outperforming gold by a narrow margin. That’s the good news. The bad news? Gold miners are still burning through cash, making them unattractive investments.

“Understandably, many shareholders are toiling with the idea of buying into gold equities given the past 12-month’s decline in share prices,” said Johann Steyn, an analyst at Citigroup, in a note. “We continue our theme of ‘don’t be tempted.’”

But rather than condemning all gold miners, Mr. Steyn holds out some hope for a select few that show more promise than their peers. These rare opportunities include Goldcorp Inc. and Barrick Gold Corp.

His negative assessment of gold miners in general comes at a time when the sector has been bloodied beyond recognition. When the price of gold fell 29 per cent in 2013, the NYSE Arca Gold Bugs index of 18 global producers plunged nearly 55 per cent, approaching 10-year lows.

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UPDATE 2-Barrick reaches initial deal with Pascua-Lama mine opponents -lawyer – by Fabian Cambero (Reuters U.S. – May 28, 2014)

http://www.reuters.com/

May 28 (Reuters) – Canadian miner Barrick Gold has come to an initial agreement with local indigenous peoples who have opposed its stalled Pascua-Lama mining project on the Chilean-Argentine border, the lawyer for the communities said on Wednesday.

Barrick, the world’s largest gold miner, halted the gold and copper project last year after investing $5 billion in it.

Development of the mine, which the local Diaguita people have strongly opposed, had been frozen by environmental regulators in Chile who demanded that infrastructure to prevent water pollution be built.

The memorandum of understanding that has now been struck between 15 of the 18 communities and Barrick is an initial step towards bringing the two sides together, Lorenzo Soto, the lawyer for the Diaguita, said on Wednesday.

“This is historical, never seen in Chile’s mining history,” Soto told Reuters in an interview. The “traditional model” of concession and environmental permits “that could go ahead even if it trod all over the rights of the local communities” has now changed, he said.

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Barrick Gold CEO Sees Growth in Nevada Following ‘Reset’ – by Liezel Hill (Bloomberg News – May 27, 2014)

 http://www.bloomberg.com/

Jamie Sokalsky has spent most of his tenure as Barrick Gold Corp. (ABX)’s chief executive officer retrenching and fighting fires. Now that the smoke is starting to clear, he’s refocusing on opportunities for growth.

The world’s biggest gold producer plans to expand in Nevada, where it got about 40 percent of its gold last year, Sokalsky said last week.

“Now that we’ve really reset the company, it’s time to talk about the future,” Sokalsky said in an interview on a Nevada hillside overlooking Goldrush, one of the projects at the top of the company’s investment plans.

Since Sokalsky, 57, took over in June 2012, Toronto-based Barrick has shed more than a quarter of its mines, raised $3 billion in a share sale and slashed its spending plans, while wrestling with a falling gold price. The company’s average costs in the first three months of 2014 fell to the lowest in at least two years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

While those austerity plans were overshadowed last month by news the company failed to buy its biggest competitor, Newmont Mining Corp. (NEM), Sokalsky says those talks are “finished” and Barrick is focused on its strategy as a standalone entity.

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Barrick, Newmont share a ‘co-operative spirit’ in Nevada – by Rachele Younglai (Globe and Mail – May 26, 2014)

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Barrick Gold Corp. and Newmont Mining Corp.’s chief executives still want to find ways to join forces in Nevada after the gold companies’ plans to merge dissolved spectacularly.

“There are opportunities to work together from an operating standpoint, particularly in Nevada, given we are partners there and given we are neighbours,” Barrick’s chief executive, Jamie Sokalsky, said in an interview. “Both myself and [Newmont chief executive] Gary Goldberg are very open to reopening those discussions,” he said.

It’s been a month since Barrick and Newmont’s merger talks imploded with the companies’ chairmen publicly accusing each other of ruining their $13-billion (U.S.) union. Since then, the world’s two largest gold producers have taken a breather from each other and are mending their relationship, with Mr. Sokalsky and Mr. Goldberg as de facto emissaries.

Mr. Sokalsky said there “certainly aren’t any” merger discussions currently taking place. But he said there was a “friendly, co-operative spirit” between the companies after the public spat between Newmont’s chairman, Vincent Calarco, and Barrick founder Peter Munk and chairman John Thornton.

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Barrick named in class action suit over troubled Pascua-Lama project – by David Paddon (Globe and Mail – May 22, 2014)

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

TORONTO — The Canadian Press – Several Canadian law firms are pursuing a class action against Barrick Gold Corp. (TSX:ABX) and some of its current and former senior officers, alleging they misrepresented how much risk the company faced when it undertook construction of the multibillion-dollar Pascua-Lama mine project in South America.

The project involves one of world’s largest deposits of gold, estimated at nearly 18 million ounces, but the company missed its original target of starting production in early 2013 due to opposition from local groups and Chilean authorities.

The suit, filed Wednesday with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, alleges Barrick described Pascua-Lama as a feasible and highly economic project due to the low cost to construct the mine and to produce gold and silver from it, adding that the company knew or should have known that it would have to overcome significant obstacles.

“The mine is located underneath glaciers in the Andes mountains and the environment is subject to extreme temperature and weather changes. Barrick is a sophisticated mining company that has constructed and operated mines all over the world.

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Barrick Gold seeks to restart suspended Pascua-Lama project after meeting with top Chilean officials – by Alexandra Ulmer and Fabian Cambero (National Post – May 20, 2014)

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

Reuters – SANTIAGO — Barrick Gold Corp, the world’s No. 1 gold miner, has met with Chilean officials and is keen to move forward with its suspended Pascua-Lama gold and copper project, in which it has already invested more than US$5 billion, Chile’s new mining minister told Reuters.

Aurora Williams, who became minister in March after President Michele Bachelet assumed power, said in an interview on Friday the Toronto-based company wanted to resolve outstanding problems so it could continue with Pascua-Lama, which straddles the Chilean and Argentine border.

Barrick surprised financial markets in October, when it shelved the massive mine over problems, including political opposition, environmental permitting, labor unrest, cost overruns and a sharp drop in bullion prices.

“We received Barrick a few days ago,” Williams said in her first interview with a foreign news organization. “They’ve showed us their interest in solving (Pascua-Lama’s) problems and doing community work, which to us appears correct … What I understand is that there’s interest that the project continue.”

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NEWS RELEASE: Barrick Gold: A tradition of giving

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

While 86-year-old Peter Munk may have stepped down as chairman of Barrick Gold, the world’s largest gold producer and the company he founded 30 years ago, his legacy of giving and corporate social responsibility lives on in many ways. “To give is part of Barrick’s DNA,” said Mr. Munk. “It’s part of who we are.”

The May 2014 edition of Beyond Borders, Barrick’s magazine, which highlights global examples of responsible mining reminds us about corporate giving with some examples close to home. Barrick regularly makes donations, which both support major institutions utilized by thousands and individual projects supporting communities where it operates.

Recently, Barrick donated $3 million to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto to support educational programs benefitting more than 150,000 students annually. The donation also led to the creation of the Barrick Gold Corporation Gallery, which tells the story of modern mining through an interactive mining game, educational touch screens, videos and the attraction of a million dollar gold coin.

“The gallery illustrates the importance of mining in our daily lives and discusses the social and environmental responsibilities surrounding mining,” said Janet Carding, Chief Executive Officer of the ROM.

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Editorial: Barrick-Newmont fling ends in acrimony – by John Cumming (Northern Miner – April 30, 2014)

The Northern Miner, first published in 1915, during the Cobalt Silver Rush, is considered Canada’s leading authority on the mining industry. Editor John Cumming MSc (Geol) is one of the country’s most well respected mining journalists.  jcumming@northernminer.com

It’s gotta rank right up with the worst “first dates” in recent mining history: the proposed merger between gold titans Barrick Gold and Newmont Mining broke off a week after it was made public through media reports in April, and then things soured with a flurry of rival press releases pinning the blame on the other party for the breakdown.

Barrick and Newmont executives had gone so far as to negotiate a term sheet for a merger that was signed by both parties on April 8, after months of private negotiations. It’s a deal that hearkened back to 2005–2006 — the era of the growth for growth’s sake mega-merger — and would have been the biggest merger in the history of gold mining.

But by April 28, merger discussions were officially terminated. It didn’t stop there, however, with discreet silence or any deflecting “it’s not you, it’s me” sentiment: Barrick put out a press release and told reporters that it had wanted to finish the merger, but Newmont’s board had backtracked.

Newmont slipped that jab, came back hard with its own, by making public a private letter it had sent to Barrick’s board the week before.

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Barrick Gold’s chair lauds Glencore over BHP as a mining model – by Liesel Hill and Simon Casey (Mail and Guardian – May 1, 2014)

http://mg.co.za/

In an exit interview, Barrick Gold’s founder Peter Munk has said Glencore Xstrata’s boss is going to “eat them all”.

Ask Peter Munk, the founder and former chairperson of Barrick Gold Corporation, whom he most admires in the mining industry, and you get a passionate, digressive response, along with a possible clue to the direction of the world’s largest gold producer.

“What Ivan Glasenberg has done equals an Olympic record,” Munk said last week in an interview, referring to the billionaire chief executive at Glencore Xstrata Plc.

It was Glasenberg who led Glencore’s 2013 takeover of Xstrata Plc, the biggest in mining. Munk, who is 86 and retired at Barrick’s annual shareholder meeting in Toronto on Wednesday, says he’s good friends with the Glencore boss and admires his ambition to compete with the biggest miners, such as Rio Tinto Group, BHP Billiton and Vale SA.

“He’s taken Xstrata, he’s now very close to the BHP Billitons, he’s going to eat them all,” Munk said. Munk’s comments are being scrutinised particularly closely after failed merger talks between Barrick and Newmont Mining Corporation degenerated this week into a public dispute between both miners.

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As Munk ‘steps down’, Barrick Gold records 90% plunge in profits – by Dorothy Kosich (Mineweb.com – May 1, 2014)

http://www.mineweb.com/

“You can take, maybe, Munk out of Barrick, (but) you can’t take Barrick out of Munk,” Peter Munk told Barrick shareholders at the company’s AGM Wednesday.

RENO (MINEWEB) – Anyone who thinks Peter Munk’s influence will no longer play a major role at Barrick Gold as he retired as co-chairman of the board Wednesday was in for a rude awakening as Munk told shareholders at the company’s annual general meeting that he intends to remain “very involved in Barrick.”

Munk’s son Anthony Munk was re-elected to the Barrick Board of Directors with 94.1% of the shareholder vote. Peter Munk will retain an office at Barrick corporate headquarters in Toronto.

As he departed from the Barrick board, Munk predicted Wednesday his greatest investment for Barrick over the past 32 years will be new Chairman of the Board John Thornton.

During Munk’s tenure as CEO, chairman, and co-chairman over the past 32 years, Munk said Barrick twice earned more money than any mining company in Canadian history, paid $8 billion in taxes, and created 25,000 jobs in 20 countries. However, along with Munk’s overall success as a CEO and chairman of Barrick, have come some staggering losses.

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Peter Munk’s bittersweet goodbye to Barrick – by Rachelle Younglai (Globe and Mail – May 1, 2014)

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Peter Munk, a Hungarian refugee whose ambitions led him to build hotels in the South Pacific and create stereos for Frank Sinatra, said goodbye to Barrick Gold Corp., the company he founded three decades ago and turned into the world’s biggest gold producer.

The 86-year-old Canadian businessman stepped down as the company’s chairman on Wednesday, a bittersweet moment for Mr. Munk, who has described Barrick as his life and the one thing that keeps him up at night.

“You can take, maybe, Munk out of Barrick. You can’t take Barrick out of Munk,” he said at the company’s annual meeting of shareholders in Toronto.

Mr. Munk knew nothing about gold mining when he took a stake in a small mine near Wawa, Ont., in 1983. He spent the next 30 years buying out rivals and building Barrick into a gold giant.

He has been succeeded by former Goldman Sachs executive John Thornton, who he says shares his vision of transforming Barrick into a Canadian-based mining titan with production in all types of metals.

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