Gold mining giant Barrick Gold Corp. (TSX:ABX, NYSE:GOLD) told investors it was working on a "well-defined strategy" to grow its business in Canada where the company believes it is under-invested.
"A significant exploration portfolio has been secured in the country’s Uchi Belt and the team is also looking at other opportunities in the country," CEO Mark Bristow said in the group's 2021 annual report, which was published on March 18.
More broadly, Bristow said Barrick was expanding globally into new prospective areas in its continued hunt for high-quality assets.
"A specialist Asia-Pacific team, set up to look at opportunities in that region, has acquired exploration permits in Japan and are hunting for additional opportunities in that region. We are also investigating projects across the Nubian and Arabian Shields in North Africa and the Middle East," he revealed.
"We have put a particularly strong focus on exploration in Latin America, where our teams are testing a portfolio of targets on the El Indio belt along the border between Argentina and Chile. We have also added ground in Peru and started fieldwork on new projects in Guyana and Suriname."
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Elsewhere, Bristow said the group was "advancing on a clear road to achievable greenhouse gas emission reduction targets and its long-standing commitment to Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) principles".
As part of the annual report, Barrick noted that in September 2018, when the Randgold merger was announced, the company had net debt of over US$4 billion. Since then, it says it has moved to a net cash position and returned US$2.5 billion of cash to shareholders, including US$1.4 billion last year. The board has also approved a US$1 billion share buyback plan.
Contact the writer at giles@proactiveinvestors.com