Categories: General Market Commentary / Precious Metals
Topics: General Market Commentary / General Precious Metals

Mining industry offering 'big premiums' for cheap stock

March 23, 2018

Juicy premiums in recent M&A offers suggest that some miners see value in beaten-down stocks, analysts said.

The premium in a proposed merger between Alio Gold Inc. and Rye Patch Gold Corp. was 35%, based on a 20-day volume-weighted average price, while Hecla Mining Co. offered a 59% premium to the 30-day volume-weighted average price in a takeover bid for Klondex Mines Ltd.

"Both show that the industry sees value; otherwise they wouldn't pay these big premiums," Kerry Smith, a Haywood Securities mining analyst, said in an email.

Don Blyth, a mining analyst with Paradigm Capital, said a recent decline in Klondex's share price drove the premium in the Hecla takeover.

"Given that negotiations between Hecla and Klondex have been going on for four months, and with the severe price decline in the Klondex shares, ultimately Hecla bought them for less than the share price [they traded at] when they started talking," he said in an email.

Brent Cook with Exploration Insights took a similar view of the deal. "Basically, Hecla knows underground mining, and Klondex was cheap and high-grade."

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