PERTH (miningweekly.com) – Gold miner St Barbara on Friday told shareholders that the revised non-binding and indicative offer submitted by ASX-listed Silver Lake Resources earlier this week, offered no material improvement on its previous offers for the Leonora assets.
St Barbara noted that the Silver Lake offer remained highly conditional, and that the suitor had not provided "any reasonable or quantative assumptions" which would allow St Barbara to assess whether the offer was supported by a genuine Gwalia business case and could be validated by due diligence.
Furthermore, the company said that Silver Lake also provided no evidence that there was sufficient support from its shareholders to approve the transaction, stating that providing Silver Lake with access to do due diligence would potentially expose St Barbara to a termination of a binding transaction agreement with Genesis Minerals.
The board of St Barbara has again, unanimously, recommended that shareholders vote in favour of the Genesis transaction, in the absence of a superior proposal.
“The St Barbara board has acted, and will continue to act, firmly in the interest of the company and its shareholders in accordance with its fiduciary duties. The St Barbara board has guided the company through a careful and diligent process with respect to the sale of the Leonora assets,” the company said in a statement.
St Barbara shareholders are set to meet on June 5 to decide on Genesis’ A$631-million offer consisting of an up-front cash payment of A$370-million, the issue of 152.8-million shares in Genesis, and an additional 52.2-million performance rights in Genesis, valued at A$60-million, which will be issued immediately upon the completion of the transaction.