African Barrick prepares for potential offer from China Gold

FTSE 250 precious metals miner African Barrick Gold (ABG) has announced that it has formed a 'Transaction Committee' as it prepares for a potential offer from China's largest gold producer, China National Gold Group.

As announced on August 16th, Barrick Gold, the US holding company of ABG, is in talks with China Gold about the possibility of selling its 73.9% stake in the London-listed miner.

The Transaction Committee is made up of three independent non-executive directors (Michael Kenyon, Derek Pannell and David Hodgson), meanwhile ABG has appointed JP Morgan Cazenove and RBC Capital Markets as financial advisers "in order to ensure that ABG is appropriately prepared and that the interests of all shareholders are represented should this situation progress," the company said.

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Should China Gold buy up more than 30% of the voting interest in ABG, it would then be required to make an offer for the whole of ABG's issued ordinary share capital, ABG said last month.

However, once again ABG assured investors that "there can be no certainty that any offer for ABG will be forthcoming."