The shareholders of Barrick Gold voted to approve the acquisition of Randgold Resources in a $6.1-billion deal.
NYSE- and TSX-listed Barrick said that 99.8% of votes at a special meeting of shareholders were in favour of the share-for-share transaction, which would create a gold leader with the industry’s greatest number of so-called Tier 1 gold assets.
“Today marks an important step in our journey [to take] Barrick ‘back to the future’,” said Barrick executive chairperson John Thornton. “The combination of Barrick and Randgold will create a compelling gold investment.”
The new Barrick group will focus on assets that produce more than 500 000 oz/y on the lower half of the cash cost curves, with a minimum life of ten years. The combined entity will have five of the world’s ten Tier 1 assets and could expand this to nine in a short space of time, Thornton said last month. The four potential Tier 1 assets waiting in the wings were Fourmile and Turquoise Ridge, in Nevada, Veladero, in Argentina, and Acacia Mining’s North Mara mine, in Tanzania.
Shareholders in London-listed Randgold were due to vote on November 7 and Barrick said that the transaction was expected to be closed on January 1.
Following the completion of the merger, Barrick shareholders will own about 66.6% and Randgold shareholders about 33.4% of the new Barrick group.
Randgold’s Mark Bristow will be president and CEO of the new Barrick group, while Thornton will be chairperson.