As mining executives make their way home from the Denver Gold Forum, they are taking pains to stamp out takeover talk that came out of the conference.

Barrick Gold, the world's largest gold company, broke with its usual practice of not commenting on rumours Thursday to shut down chatter that it is interested in Kinross Gold, with senior vice president Vince Borg saying “Barrick Gold is not contemplating acquisitions at this time, and is specifically not contemplating any transaction involving Kinross.”

And sources close to New Gold and Goldcorp played down noise that the two are working on a combined bid for IAMGOLD.