Mining Firm Closes last big gold 2011

Mining Firm Closes last big gold 2011
Mining Firm Closes last big gold 2011

ANGLOGOLD ASHANTI – the world's fourth-largest Gold Mining company – said today that it's finished closing its "hedge book" of forward sales, buying back gold it had sold ahead of production at an average price of $1300 per ounce.

The New York-listed Gold Mining company says it will now sell all the gold it produces "at market prices", thereby improving cash-flow and profit margins after becoming the last of the world's major miners to retain a sizeable position in forward sales.

"We've moved decisively to eliminate the hedge book," said chief executive officer Mark Cutifani in a press release.

"The completion of the hedge book restructure over the last three years has created about US$4.0 billion of value for our shareholders and represents one of the major building blocks for the new AngloGold Ashanti.

"We remain bullish on the outlook for gold and will now benefit from full exposure to the price as we go forward."

forex : prices of gold 2011

World stock markets were little changed, with both Tokyo and Toronto closed for national holidays.

German and UK bonds slipped back, nudging interest rates higher. The US bond market stayed shut for Columbus Day.
That correlation would read +1.0 if gold and the Euro moved perfectly in lock-step, or minus 1.0 if they were perfectly opposed.

Gold Prices had diverged dramatically from the Euro during this spring's Greek deficit crisis, with the correlation sinking to –0.92 in May as both gold and the Dollar leapt vs. the single European currency.

Over the last 10 years, daily gold and Euro prices have displayed a strong, positive correlation of +0.50 vs. the Dollar.