A general view of the construction at Barrick Gold's gold processing plant at the Pacua-Lama mine in Argentina in this May 8, 2013 picture provided by Barrick.Handout/Reuters
The banks underwriting the $3-billion (U.S.) Barrick Gold Corp. stock sale have only found homes for about three-quarters of the stock, meaning there is still $750-million or so unsold.
As of Thursday night, the transaction was said to be 75 per cent spoken for. As of Friday, the number had not changed much. That's to be expected – gold prices slid in Friday trading, taking Barrick stock well below the $18.35 a share offer price.
The banks have been working for more than a week to try to complete a book of orders for the deal. Royal Bank of Canada, GMP Securities and Barclays are leading the transaction.
One issue has been a lack of clarity on when Barrick Gold would follow through with a promise to revamp its board. The company gave more detail on that Friday, signalling that it would happen at the annual meeting next spring, and that this would include the retirement of powerful chairman Peter Munk.