Wheaton to buy EBX Gold, get Brazil project

[G-khan]

Thursday November 6, 5:27 PM EST


(In U.S. dollars unless noted)

VANCOUVER, British Columbia , Nov 6 (Reuters) - Mid-sized gold producer Wheaton River Minerals Ltd. continued its acquisition spree on Thursday, saying it will pay about $105 million for a small gold firm with a project in Brazil.

Wheaton said it will purchase all of EBX Gold Ltd., which owns the Amapari project, an open-pit and underground deposit Wheaton chief executive Ian Telfer described as "one of the best undeveloped gold assets in the Americas".

The Vancouver-based firm said Amapari contains 1.7 million ounces of measured and indicated gold resource, which includes 1.4 million of proven and probable reserve ounces. It also has an inferred resource -- an early-stage estimate -- of a million ounces as well as "extensive" exploration potential.

To foot the tab, the mining firm will pay $25 million in cash and issue 33 million in Wheaton shares and 21.5 million in Wheaton purchase warrants.

Wheaton's shares slumped 19 Canadian cents, or more than 6 percent, on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Thursday, closing at C$2.77. The gold board finished down 1.5 percent.

Telfer said he was confident the Amapari project could be brought into production during 2005, boosting Wheaton's forecast 2006 production to around 900,000 ounces of metal at a cash cost of less than $140 an ounce.

Wheaton produces over 500,000 ounces a year at a cash cost of around $100 per ounce. It has grown from a minnow to a medium-sized gold miner in a very short period through a string of acquisitions, the most recent being the September purchase of the Los Filos gold deposit in Mexico.

($1=$1.34 Canadian)

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