Junior Mining M&A - Silver Standard Purchase Marigold Mine

Silver Standard continue the theme of Junior / Mid-Tier miners buying quality but non-core assets from the majors, in this case the Marigold Mine from Barrick & Goldcorp for $275m

This follows Silver Standard's sale of the San Agustin gold/silver project in Mexico to Argonaut for $75m  and the sale of the Challacollo Silver Project in Chile to Mandalay for $15.8m
Funded from cash on hand Silver Standard have now diversified from silver to gold production and into the heart of Nevada gold production (they also have two silver projects in Nevada). 150k oz pa production and almost 5m oz P&P with recent investments in mine equipment and efficiency seems pretty good for the price.
It moves SSRI a long way from their past of holding silver in the ground without getting involved in development although they continue to hold a large silver "inventory in the ground" if silver prices bring excitement back to the sector. At Q3-13 they also continued to hold their large investment in "spin-off" Pretium Resources, approx 18% of $690 Mcap.

Comment and more facts at       Mineweb      CEO-CA          Inca Kola

Silver Standard intends to focus on the higher-grade ore and to reduce the overall strip ratio to reduce operating costs.  They are going to complete a new life-of-mine plan which will incorporate newer and more efficient mining equipment.

The stock was down on the day but seemed to recover later