Perseus boss confirms M&A interests but baulks at price
Gold miner Perseus has taken a swipe at potential takeover target Predictive Discovery, over a private share placement.
Perseus Mining boss Jeff Quartermaine has taken a swipe at potential takeover target Predictive Discovery over a private share placement that saw Sweden’s super-rich Lundin family and a Chinese gold heavyweight join the register.
Mr Quartermaine said Predictive was “very expensive” as he tried to hose down speculation of an imminent takeover bid for the gold hopeful and its Bankan project in the west African nation of Guinea.
He said Perseus was looking at Predictive but “quite some distance away from activating that situation”. The two companies have headquartered a short distance apart in the Perth suburb of Subiaco and both focus on gold mining in Africa.
The Perseus stake in Predictive was watered down slightly earlier this month when the Lundin family paid $45.1m for 6.5 per cent of the stock and Zijin Mining outlaid $24.1m for 3.5 per cent via a private share placement.
Predictive now has a market capitalisation of about $900m after the stock ran hard from the end of January and jumped again when the Lundins and Zijin came on board.
Mr Quartermaine said it would be remiss for him not to mention Predictive as Perseus reported a big increase in interim profit from its gold mines in Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire.
“This is something that’s been a topic of conversation among a lot of shareholders in recent weeks,” he said.
“The situation with Predictive is that we do have a shareholding – I think it’s about 17.8-17.9 per cent following the issue of some shares about a week ago.
“Where we stand at the moment is that we need to evaluate the opportunity thoroughly and if it makes sense for Perseus then we would move forward.
“However, I stress the point that if it does not make sense then we will not be moving forward and we will look to liquidate the position. The thing is that the company in our view is very expensive right now, not particularly helped by the share placement last week.
“It’s an expensive proposition, particularly when you look at the acquisition price of the company, the cost to develop the project and any taxes related to the transaction.”
Mr Quartermaine was similarly downbeat about OreCorp in the lead-up to winning a $270m takeover battle for the Tanzanian gold exploration group last year.
Perseus reported interim net profit after tax of $US201m, up 22 per cent from the same time last year. It ended the first half with net cash and bullion of $US704m, an increase of $US117m from 30 June in 2024.
