AngloGold may sell US asset

Johannesburg - Africa's top bullion producer AngloGold Ashanti [JSE:ANG] said it was seeking a partner or buyer for its Cripple Creek & Victor (CC&V) mine in the US and had received an approach for the purchase of its stakes in two mines in Mali.

AngloGold has said it wants to reduce debt and on Tuesday said the stake sales were in line with an "objective to simplify and improve the overall quality of its portfolio".

CC&V is a surface mining operation in Colorado, which produced 211 000 ounces of bullion last year.

"AngloGold confirms that it has been approached by a potential buyer who meets its qualifying criteria, and a binding bid has been requested," the company said regarding its stakes in the Sadiola and Yatela mines in Mali.

"The company intends to dispose of its 41% stake in Sadiola and its 40% stake in Yatela, which produced 85 000 and 11 000 attributable ounces of gold respectively, in 2014," the company said.

AngloGold, which produced 4.44 million ounces last year, had debt at the end of 2014 of just over $3.1bn, giving it a debt to EBITDA ratio of 1.88. It has said it wants to reduce this by at least $1bn over the next one to three years.

A sale of assets had also been widely expected since a shareholder revolt last year forced the company to scrap a planned demerger and rights issue just five days after the proposals were announced.

The $2.1bn rights issue was aimed at paring its debt, which chief executive Srinivasan Venkatakrishnan has called "unsustainably high".