Newmont Mining terminates merger talks with Barrick Gold

Newmont Mining Corp today terminated merger talks with Canada's Barrick Gold Corp, and blamed its suitor's co-chairman for the failed deal (See: Merger talks between Barrick Gold and Newmont Mining collapse).

''Over the past number of months, our two companies have been working hard to find a basis on which we could merge and realize their combined strengths ……. it has become evident to us over the past several weeks that the type of constructive, mutually respectful and partnership-oriented relationship necessary to realize the potential benefits of that combination does not yet exist,'' said Newmont's chairman Vincent Calarco in a letter to Barrick's board.

''Our Board has met a number of times since we were twice told definitively last Thursday by your Co-Chairman that the process in which we had been engaged to find a basis to merge our two companies was ''dead,'' the letter added.

Denver-based Newmont was criticising Barrick's outgoing chairman and founder Peter Munk and incoming chairman John Thornton for torpedoing the deal. According to media reports both companies could not come to terms on the board and management structure of the new company.

Barrick Gold and Newmont Mining, the world's two largest gold producers, recently held talks to merge and were planning to announce a deal as early last week.

The merger would have created a gold mining giant with mines spread across from Indonesia to Africa and throughout North and South America.

The merger would also have created a company with a market value of around $35 billion, and annual sales of $20.8 billion.

Both companies had also held talks to merge in 2008 and in 2010, but the discussions had broken down then also.

Barrick Gold, based in Toronto, has mines located in the US, Zambia, Chile, Dominican Republic, Argentina, Tanzania, Canada, Saudi Arabia, Australia, Papua New Guinea, and Peru.

As of 31 December 2013, the company had proven and probable mineral reserves of 104.1 million ounces of gold and 14.0 billion pounds of copper.

It has a market cap of $23.1 billion and annual sales of $12.5 billion.

With a market cap of $11.7 billion and annual sales of $8.3 billion, New York Stock Exchange-listed Newmont Mining has operations in the US, Australia, Peru, Indonesia, Ghana, New Zealand and Mexico.

The Colorado-based company has proven and probable gold reserves of approximately 88.4 million ounces.