The news came with a trading halt on Barrick’s stock on the TSX effective 12:04pm Toronto time, and on stock inSilver Wheaton (NYSE:SLW) (TSE:SLW), the embattled giant’s partner on the project, a few minutes later. Prior to the stop trade order, stock in Barrick was trading down, hitting an intraday low of $19.41 per share from an open of $19.56, a far cry from the stock’s 52 week high of $43.30  per share.

U.S. stocks pared losses on Friday, with the Dow industrials actually breaking into positive territory during the afternoon session, as encouraging durable goods data helped soften bouts of profit-taking ahead of the long weekend. Benchmark indices were still on pace to break four straight weeks of gains. 

Canadian shares declined for a second day, led by miners, as gold fell for the third time in four days. The commodity-heavy Standard & Poor’s/TSX Composite Index (TSE:OSPTX) slid 0.2 percent to 12,633.81 at 12:38 p.m. in Toronto on Friday. The 237-member gauge has gained 1.6 percent this month. The materials subindex, which includes mining shares, fell 0.7 percent. The energy subindex slipped 0.4 percent as oil dropped for a fourth day, while financials, the most heavily-weighted group, slid 0.2 percent.

U.S. stocks were still down on Friday despite encouraging durable goods orders data, as profit-taking ensued ahead of long weekends in both the U.S. and U.K., with benchmark indexes on pace to break four straight weeks of gains.