Not quite as big a failure as you it seems Skoly.In 1982, he co-founded, alongwith his business partner Seymour Schulich, Franco-Nevada Corporation, the first publicly traded gold royalty company. In 1985, Franco-Nevada acquired for US$2 million a royalty on a small mining operation in the heart of the Carlin gold belt of Nevada. Two years later, the property was acquired by Barrick Gold, who discovered the world class Goldstrike deposit. From inception to February 2002, when the company was sold to Newmont Mining for US$3.2billion, Franco-Nevada provided its shareholders a 36% annualized rate of return.[5]
Lassonde served as President of Newmont Mining Corp. from February2002 to 2007 and vice-chairman in 2007.
In 2008, Lassonde revived Franco-Nevada by joining forces with DavidHarquail and the rest of the original Franco-Nevada team to acquire Newmont'sroyalty portfolio. The born-again Franco-Nevada became the largest mining IPO(initial public offering) ever offered on the TSE (Toronto Stock Exchange) atthat time.[6] The marketcapitalization of the company was more than US$25 billion in December 2020. After 35years with Franco-Nevada, at the Annual Meeting of May 6, 2020, Lassondestepped down as chairman and was elected Chairman Emeritus.[7]
In 1993, Lassonde led a group of investors in another startup, MetallicaResources. The company was responsible for the discovery of the world-classEl Morro deposit in Chile and the Cerro San Pedro mine in Mexico. In 2010,Metallica merged with Peak Gold and Newgold and later on with WesternGoldfields Resources to create a leading mid-size gold-producing company. Heleft the Board of Newgold in 2014.
In 1995, Lassonde backed his late wife Claudette MacKay-Lassondein the startup of Enghouse Systems Ltd, a provider of software to the telecommunicationcompanies. The company today has revenues of over $500 million per year andmarket capitalization of over $3 billion (December 2020). He is thesecond-largest shareholder and a Director of the company.
Lassonde remains involved in gold mining through his private familyoffice Firelight Investment LLC. He is one of the main shareholder of OrlaMining, which he helped create, as well as companies such as America Gold andSilver, Prime Mining, and Marathon Gold.
Lassonde served as Chairman of the World Gold Council from 2005 to 2009.[8][9]
In addition, Lassonde authored in 1990 The Gold Book:The Complete Investment Guide to Precious Metals.[10]
