Newmont, the world’s largest gold miner, has bid to take over Australia’s largest listed gold company Newcrest as the industry looks to consolidate to cope with rising costs.
Newcrest, which has a market value of A$20bn ($14bn) said it had received a non-binding conditional offer from its US rival over an all-share deal. It revealed that it had already rejected one offer from Newmont pitched at a lower level as it did not provide sufficient value.
The new proposal, which would offer 0.38 Newmont shares for every Newcrest share, would also include a plan to list the Newmont stock issued to pay for the transaction on the Australian Stock Exchange. Newcrest, which is being advised by JPMorgan and Gresham Advisory Partners, said it would consider the new bid.
The approach is the latest move to consolidate the global gold producing industry at a time when rising costs have forced companies to consider deals to boost scale.
The talks were first reported by The Australian Financial Review.
A deal would bring the two companies back together. Melbourne-based Newcrest was established in the 1960s as Newmont’s Australia arm. It later merged with BHP’s gold operations and rebranded as an independent business operating in Australia, Canada and Papua New Guinea
