Canadian miner Kinross Gold Corp will keep its main expansion in Mauritania on hold to 2015, no matter how far the gold price rises, as it plans to save rather than spend for now, its chief executive told Reuters. Kinross, which has assets in the Americas, West Africa and Russia, has deferred a decision on the $2.7 billion expansion of its Tasiast mill in Mauritania to 2015, whatever the findings of a feasibility study due in early 2014.
The delay, as well as the suspension of the firm's semi-annual dividend, follows a one-quarter drop in gold prices since January. "The decision to suspend the dividend and defer a decision on the Tasiast mill was about 'Let's have a save-year instead of a spend-year' while we see where the gold price settles down", chief executive Paul Rollinson said in an interview last Thursday at the launch of a new Kinross mine in north-eastern Russia. He added that as a result of this decision, the company has laid off a number of expatriates and scaled back its activity at Tasiast, so it would take time to ramp up the project even if the gold price returns to its historic highs.