Article in AFR, interesting that Red Lake is cost of production is quoted at USD1600 per ounce.
Evolution joins Australian gold rush into North America
The rush of Australian gold miners into North America continues –Evolution Mining is spending at least $US375 million ($550 million) on an old gold mine in Canada's Ontario province.
Evolution is betting it can turn around performance at the Newmont Goldcorp asset, known as Red Lake, which has been producing gold since 1949 and is currently a high-cost asset producing gold for about $US1600 per ounce.
That cost base does not compare favourably with Tuesday's gold price, which was $US1455 per ounce, and Evolution said the poor performance was a result of under-investment by Newmont.
Evolution will spend $US150 million trying to improve the asset's performance over the next three years, and chief executive Jake Klein said Red Lake had high potential.
Evolution could pay up to an additional $US100 million to Newmont, depending on future exploration success at the site.
It will fund the deal with a new $600 million loan.
The deal is the fourth time an Australian gold company has bought a North American asset in the past 18 months.
Northern Star kicked off the trend in August 2018 when it acquired Alaska's Pogo asset, and Newcrest Mining acquired 70 per cent of Imperial Metals' Red Chris mine in British Colombia in March. St Barbara followed suit with the $768 million acquisition of Atlantic Gold in May.
It also continues the trend for the world's biggest gold miners, Newmont and Barrick, to be casting off their non-core assets following big mergers with Goldcorp and Randgold, respectively, over the past year.
Just last week, Barrick achieved its long-held goal to quit Kalgoorlie's Superpit mine, selling its 50 per cent stake to ASX-listed Saracen Mineral Holdings.
Evolution's acquisition came on a big day for mergers and acquisitions in the Canadian gold sector, with Kirkland Lake Gold acquiring fellow Toronto resident Detour Gold in a scrip deal worth about $5.4 billion.
The deal is focused on Detour's Ontario assets and does not appear to have any impact on Kirkland Lake's Fosterville mine near the Australian city of Bendigo.
(20min delay)