Barrick to lay off up to a third of corporate staff - sources

According to sources, the cuts were announced by Barrick's Chief Executive Jamie Sokalsky at a town hall meeting with staff in Toronto last week.

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Author: Euan Rocha (Reuters)
Posted: Monday , 24 Jun 2013

TORONTO (Reuters) -

Barrick Gold Corp will lay off up to a third of its corporate staff at its headquarters in Toronto and other offices, sources said, as the world's top bullion producer intensifies a downsizing plan amid a slump in the price of gold.

Barrick and miners such as Newmont Mining and Newcrest Mining are shaking up operations and taking measures like shutting down development projects, slashing exploration spending and cutting jobs due to the sliding gold price.

The cuts were announced by Barrick's Chief Executive Jamie Sokalsky at a town hall meeting with staff in Toronto last week, said the sources, who asked not to be named as they are not officially authorized to speak about the matter.

One source said this is the first ever round of across-the- board layoffs for the company at its corporate headquarters in Toronto. Besides the falling gold price, it is also facing operational and regulatory issues at some of its mines and projects.

Barrick has over 400 people working as corporate staff with the vast majority of those located in Toronto, said the sources.

A spokesman for Barrick was not immediately able to comment on the matter.

The cuts in Toronto are set to begin on Monday and will be completed before the end of the week, while the cuts that impact corporate staff in offices like Vancouver and elsewhere, could drag into July, said one source.

The sources said Sokalsky, a long-time Barrick hand who took over as CEO barely a year ago, was visibly emotional during the mid-week town hall meeting with employees. He declined to take any questions from employees and informed staff that their direct managers would respond to their questions.

The company, which has roughly 25,000 employees across the globe, is also in the process of cutting jobs at a number of its mine sites. Last week, it announced that it was cutting about 50 employees at its operations in the United States, and earlier this month it announced a few dozen cuts in Australia.

Gold extended last week's 7 percent drop on Monday, hurt by a stronger dollar and worries over an early end to U.S. Federal Reserve stimulus.

Spot gold, which peaked at over $1,900 an ounce in late 2011, was trading at $1,290 an ounce by 0430 GMT on Monday, not far from a near-three year low touched last week.

Earlier this month, Newmont announced that it would be cutting its workforce at its home base in Denver, Colorado, by at least 33 percent over the coming three months. And Australia gold producer Newcrest said it would write down its asset values by about $6 billion.

Barrick's own share price has been pummeled amid the slump in gold, soaring capital expenditure costs at its huge Pascua Lama project on the border of Chile and Argentina, and setbacks at its copper mines in Zambia and Saudi Arabia.

Its shares, which have more than halved in value over the course of the last year, are trading at around a 20-year low on the Toronto Stock Exchange. They closed at C$17.71 on the TSX on Friday.

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