Takeover speculation, page-60

Bellevue Gold could well have been included in the above discovery section thanks to on-going exploration success at its namesake high-grade gold project near Leinster. But the Northern Star-Saracen merger has put it in the spotlight as a potential takeover target.Bellevue boss Steve Parsons presents to the conference after lunch on the Wednesday, when he can be expected to put some more colour around this week’s news on the discovery of another high-grade lode called Armand (4.6m at 13.8g/t gold).Drilling continues with a view to including Armand in Bellevue’s next resource update, remembering that the current 2.3Moz resource grading 10g/t was put together in under 24 months.More than 20 analysts and investors will be hosted at the site before the conference kicks off so it will be interesting to see how Bellevue performs ahead of Parsons’ presentation.The assumption is that there will be lots of chatter on the dusty tour bus out to the project about the implications for Bellevue from the Northern Star-Saracen merger.A feature of the Northern Star-Saracen merger is it creates a regional processing powerhouse by bringing together Saracen’s Thunderbox operation with Northern Star’s Jundee, and its currently idled Bronzewing.On a combined base, that represents 5.5mtpa of processing capacity, increasing to 8.5mtpa in FY2022. One of the key selling points of the merger is the benefits to flow from having the “right ore going to the best mill”.Bellevue doesn’t have a mill but it does have the right ore (higher grade) which is very truckable to the regionally close Bronzewing and Thunderbox. To some, one of the first moves of the merged group should be to take out Bellevue.Such a move won’t necessarily add to the targeted 600,000oz of annual regional production from Jundee, Thunderbox and Bronzewing. But including Bellevue’s high-grade ore in the mix would certainly enhance overall margins.Last year, Parsons collected D & D’s “Best Emerging Company” award at the conference. It remains to be seen if he has a shot at picking up the Mining Award on a successful stand-alone development at Bellevue, or if the company gets swallowed first.Having said that, speculation that Silver Lake has Bellevue in its sights continues. So if Bellevue does get knocked off, it could well be in a contested battle. And investors love a good fight.Bellevue last traded at $1.10 for a market cap of $945m. It was a penny dreadful 24 months ago, such is the power of the drill bit to create value.