Newmont Frees Up More Cash and the Stock Surges. Why It’s a Top S&P 500 Name.

The sale of its stake in Orla Mining brought Newmont’s total equity sale proceeds to $900 million this year. (Businesswire)

Newmont has sold its entire 13% ownership stake in fellow gold miner Orla Mining, as the company continues to shed equity holdings and focus on stock buybacks.

Newmonth offloaded around 43 million shares for gross proceeds of $439 million, the company said Friday.

Wall Street seemed to view the sale as a win for Newmont, the world’s largest gold producer.

The stock was rising 2.9% to $80.63 Friday, making it one of the top performers in the S&P 500 and putting it on track for the highest close since April 20, 2022, per Dow Jones Market Data. Newmont was a Barron’s stock pick last month.

New York-listed shares of Orla, which is headquartered in Canada, slumped 6.8% on Friday. The stock has climbed nearly 150% over the last 12 months, perhaps explaining why Newmont decided to cash in now.

The move marks another step in Newmont’s efforts to divest non-core assets, sell equity holdings, and return capital to investors while gold prices and mining stocks continue to surge. The company has now brought in around $900 million in after-tax proceeds this year from selling equity holdings, it said.

“Today’s announcement demonstrates Newmont’s ongoing commitment to streamlining our equity portfolio and unlocks significant cash to support Newmont’s capital allocation priorities,” said CEO Tom Palmer.

The company sold its Musselwhite mine in rural Ontario to Orla for up to $850 million in March. Just this week, Newmont agreed to sell its Coffee Project in Yukon, Canada to Fuerte Metals for up to $150 million. Newmont has also sold equity stakes in companies such as Greatland Resources, Discovery Silver, and Orosur Mining in recent months.

These sales, plus the strong cash flow from its mining operations, have helped empower the Newmont board to authorize $6 billion in share repurchases as of July.

Other gold-mining stocks were also on the rise Friday. New York-listed shares of Barrick Mining were climbing 7%, Agnico Eagle Mines were up 2.5%, and Alamos was rising 1.9%.

Write to Nate Wolf at nate.wolf@barrons.com