ANGLOGOLD Ashanti is to buy properties in Nevada’s Beatty district containing an estimated 914,000 ounces in mineral resources.
The Johannesburg-headquartered group announced today it had agreed to the $150m purchase of Coeur Mining’s subsidiary Coeur Sterling which owns the properties. They include the decommissioned Sterling mine as well as four other principal properties.
On completion of the transaction, expected to be before the calendar year-end – AngloGold will have spent $670m consolidating the region on which a major part of its resource replacement and growth strategy rests.
In September last year, it concluded the $370m purchase of Corvus Gold which owns the prominent North Bullfrog prospect on which AngloGold is currently running a feasibility study. A mineral resource on North Bullfrog, as well as another called Mother Lode, is due to be made in February.
Should exploration grow the mineral resource of the Coeur Sterling properties to 3.5 million oz, AngloGold will be required to pay Coeur Mining a further $50m.
“The addition of these properties consolidates our ownership position in one of North America’s most promising new gold districts, and gives us the ability to develop it in a way that will realise its full potential for the benefit of all stakeholders,” said Alberto Calderon, CEO of AngloGold.
The expectation is that AngloGold will derive about 300,000 oz in annual gold production at an all-in sustaining cost of below $1,000 per oz from the Nevada region by the end of the decade.
