Canadian miner Barrick Gold Corp said on Tuesday its full-year preliminary production of gold fell from a year earlier, even as output rose sequentially in the fourth quarter.
The world’s second-largest gold miner said in November its 2023 gold production was forecast to be lower than expected due to equipment issues at its Dominican Republic mine and lower output at two sites in the Nevada Gold Fields project.
Barrick reported a 2.17% fall in 2023 gold output at 4.05 million ounces from a year earlier, which came below its forecast, and analysts’ average estimate of 4.16 million ounces, according to LSEG data.
Copper production also fell 4.76% to 420 million pounds. Analysts had estimated 433 million pounds of output.
Shares of the Toronto-based company fell nearly 4.1% to C$22.67, while US-listed shares were down 4.7% at $16.82. Gold was down 0.8% at around 10:00 a.m. ET.
Barrick’s fourth-quarter output, however, rose to 1.05 million ounces of gold and 113 million pounds of copper, from 1.04 million ounces of gold and 112 million pounds of copper in the previous quarter.
The company said it expects all-in sustaining costs (AISC) per ounce of gold, an industry metric that reflects total expenses, to rise about 8% to 10% and copper’s AISC to be 2% to 4% lower from the previous quarter.
Barrick is scheduled to release its fourth-quarter results on Feb. 14.
(By Seher Dareen; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)
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