Gold explorer Cardinal Resources has received an indicative nonbinding takeover offer from shareholder Nord Gold (Nordgold), which values the Australian company at A$227-million.
Nordgold has more than 98.4-million shares in Cardinal. This shareholding gives the company a 19.9% interest in the ASX-listed junior. The shareholding includes more than 81-million shares acquired from a subsidiary of Gold Fields at a price of 45c per share.
Nordgold has provided Cardinal with a nonbinding indicative and conditional proposal to acquire all the company’s outstanding shares for an offer price of 45.77c per share, valuing Cardinal at about A$227-million.
The offer represented a cash premium of 83% to Cardinal’s closing price on March 13, Nordgold said last week.
Nordgold is seeking access to conduct a due diligence investigation on certain key aspects of Cardinal’s Namindi gold project, in Ghana, where the company was recently granted a water extraction licence and had its resettlement action plan approved by the Ghanaian government.
An October feasibility study into the project estimated that it would produce some 4.2-million ounces of gold over a mine life of 15 years, with an estimated 1.1-million ounces expected over the first three years of the operation. Namindi is expected to cost $390-million to develop.