Gold mining company Kirkland Lake on Thursday announced that it had disposed of its shareholding in Osisko Mining and that it had reduced its interest in Novo Resources.

The company, which trades in the Toronto, New York and Sydney, sold 32 627 632 common shares of Osisko through the facilities of the TSX at $4.45 a share for a total consideration of $145.19-million. Following the disposition, Kirkland no longer holds any shares of Osisko.

In the last week, Kirkland also reduced its shareholding in Novo by selling 538 700 common shares at an average price of $3.52 a share, for a total consideration of $1.89-million. This followed the sale of 210 000 shares at an average price of $3.28 for $689 024 in June.

Prior to the dispositions, the company held about 15.81% of the issued and outstanding shares of Novo on a non-diluted basis and 21.62% on a partially diluted basis. The completion of these dispositions has resulted in a 0.4% decrease in the company’s holdings in Novo.

“The sale of Osisko and Novo shares further enhances our already industry-leading financial strength, which will support our efforts as we pursue our key strategic priorities, including investing in our three cornerstone assets and returning capital to shareholders. Macassa, Detour Lake and Fosterville are three highly-profitable, cash-flow generating operations, each of which has outstanding exploration upside,” commented CEO Tony Makuch.

He also pointed out the importance of rewarding Kirkland shareholders which, in addition to share price performance, also involved buying back stock and paying dividends.

“So far in 2020, we have repurchased 11.9-million shares for $388.4-million, which represents approximately $1.40 per share based on our current shares outstanding, and also doubled our quarterly dividend to $0.125 a share. If we combine the amount of cash used for share repurchases and dividend payments in the first half of 2020, it represents approximately $645 per ounce of gold produced during the period. We announced earlier in the year a goal of repurchasing 20-million shares over a 12- to 24-month period and we are making excellent progress towards achieving that target.”  

Both the Osisko shares and the Novo shares were sold for investment purposes.