B2Gold buys Oklo Resources for A$91.3m in shares and cash

B2Gold's Fekola Gold Mine, Mali

B2GOLD said on Wednesday it intended to buy Oklo Resources, an Australian listed company that owns “extensive land packages” near to its Fekola gold mine in Mali for about  A$91.3m in cash and shares.

The Toronto-listed miner expects to issue up to 10,75 million B2Gold Shares to Oklo shareholders, representing approximately 1% of total shares. The cash component of the transaction is approximately A$27.4m. All in all, the Toronto-listed firm will pay the equivalent of A$0.1725 for each Oklo Share.

In return, B2Gold will receive 1,504 square kilometres of property of which the area of specific interest is Oklo’s flagship Dandoko property about 25 kilometres from Fekola and a similar distance from Anaconda, a land packet extension of the same orebody.

In March 2021, Oklo delivered an initial JORC 2012 compliant measured and indicated mineral resource estimate of 8.70 million tons at 1.88 grams per tonfor 528,000 ounces of gold and an inferred mineral resource estimate of 2.63 million tons at 1.67 g/t for 141,000 oz of gold.

B2Gold forecasts total consolidated gold production of between 990,000 and 1,050,000 oz in 2022 of which about half is from Fekola. Fekola is the eleventh largest gold mine in the world currently producing around 570,000 oz of gold annually.

B2Gold said in May that it was looking to double production by reaching one million ounces from Mali. This would make good on CEO Clive Johnson’s prediction two years ago that the company was moving into “elephant country” north of its Fekola mine.