Brigus Gold (BRD.TO: Quote) plans to sell or set up a joint-venture for its gold project in southern Mexico, in a move to focus on its main assets in Ontario and Saskatchewan, said Chief Executive Wade Dawe.

Peruvian presidential front-runner Alejandro Toledo said on Wednesday if elected he would talk with extractive industries about possibly introducing a tax on windfall profits as commodities prices surge. Toledo, who in his first term from 2001 to 2006 helped lure billions in foreign investment to Peru, said voters need to see concrete benefits from mining, oil and gas activity.

Institutional shareholders in Riversdale Mining are moving toward backing global miner Rio Tinto's sweetened A$3.9 billion takeover offer for the Mozambique-focused coal miner, Riversdale's chief executive said on Thursday. Rio Tinto raised its offer to A$16.50 a share on Thursday in a final bid to woo key shareholders who have held up the deal, and extended the offer for a third time, to April 1.

Riversdale Mining head Steve Mallyon has backed Rio Tinto's increased offer for the coal company, warning investors there was no hint of a competing bid, The Wall Street Journal reported. The global giant today said it would increase its offer to $16.50 a share from $16 a share, if it gained more than a 50 per cent interest in the Mozambique-focussed company by March 23. Rio said it would not increase its offer beyond that point unless there was a competing proposal.

Equinox Minerals would consider selling some of Lundin Mining's assets in order to clear off debt, the company's CEO said in a conference call to analysts on Thursday. Equinox has bid CAD$4.8 billion in a challenge to Inmet Mining's friendly merger with Lundin, but needs a $3.2 billion bridge loan, according to the story by Bloomberg. “We would consider asset sales in the context of non-core, non-copper assets,” Craig Williams, chief executive of the Perth-based company, said today. Equinox may sell Lundin’s Zinkgruvan zinc mine in Sweden, he said.

HudBay Minerals posted some big gains in its fourth-quarter and year-end financials, the Toronto-based miner reported on Wednesday. Net earnings in Q4 2010 more than tripled to $24.5 million, compared to $7.2 million in the fourth quarter of 2009. Year-end numbers were also impressive, with net earnings of $73 million — a 475% increase over 2009 after adjusting for gains on the sale of investments, the company stated.

Bayfield Ventures Corp. announced a $5 million brokered private placement Wednesday, with proceeds going towards the company's Rainy River gold project in northern Ontario. The deal is expected to close on April 7. The 100%-owned Rainy River property contains three mineralized claim blocks. The March 2010 NI 43101 report showed 2.37 million indicated ounces of gold at 1.3 g/t, with an additional 2.66 million ounces inferred at 1.2 g/t Au.

China's move on Kalahari Minerals could flush out other bidders for the uranium miner but even long-term suitor Rio Tinto may balk at getting into a bidding war with such a formidable foe.

Lake Shore Gold (LSG.TO) expects to double the size of its gold resource over the next 12 months and aims to produce about 300,000 ounces a year of gold by 2013, said one of the junior miner's top executives on Tuesday. "We don't think it's unreasonable to think that we may have found a new century of gold mining in a century-old mining camp," said Mark Utting, Lake Shore's head of investor relations.