Sept 23 (Reuters) - Canada's Barrick Gold Corp ABX.TO and African miner Randgold Resources Ltd RRS.L are in advanced stages of negotiations to merge their operations, Bloomberg reported on Sunday, citing sources.
A deal about the merger of the two mining companies is imminent, a blog IKN, had earlier reported. https://bloom.bg/2QUaYa7
Barrick Gold's Andy Lloyd declined to comment. Randgold Resources did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
Canada-based Barrick, a majority shareholder in Acacia Mining Plc ACAA.L , struck a framework deal in October of last year with Tanzania that was supposed to resolve a tax dispute. Under that deal, Acacia would pay $300 million to Tanzania's government, hand over a 16 percent stake in its mines and split "economic benefits" from operations. in June could not provide a new deadline for the completion of talks to end the tax dispute in Tanzania after failing to meet a mid-year target to do so. Gold has a market capitalization of C$18.78 billion ($14.53 billion) and Randgold Resources has a market capitalization of 4.6 billion British pounds ($6.02 billion), according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. ($1 = 1.2925 Canadian dollars)