The chief executive of Randgold Resources, London’s biggest listed gold producer, reckons gold prices are likely to push higher as a decade of loose monetary policy comes to an end.
“We have populist politics, a very brittle global economy underpinned by an enormous quantitative easing and a decade of free money and that’s uncharted territory,” Mark Bristow said in an interview with the Financial Times on Thursday.
“Gold will always play a bigger role in time of uncertainty and change in the financial markets as well the global economy.”
He added: “It’s hard to see the central bank enforcing the discipline needed to suck that massive oversupply of money out of the system before it really hurt the economy.”
Gold has risen 10 per cent this year to $1,278 a troy ounce, but it traded as high as in $1,350 in September, spurred by concerns over lofty equity market valuations and geopolitical tensions with North Korea
Mr Bristow was speaking after Randgold announced third-quarter results, which missed market forecasts. That saw the company’s shares drop 480p to £69.85.
The company had flagged the likelihood of a soft third quarter. It said it was still on course to hit the top end of production guidance of 1.25m and 1.3m ounces of gold this year.
“Our cash position is $620 and that augurs well for our dividend strategy,” added Mr Bristow, who said that figure could swell to $700m by the end end.
Randgold wants to keep $500m cash on its balance sheet to support its development strategies and has pledged to return the rest to shareholders.
Randgold is trying to define three new projects as it seeks to replace output from its Tongon project in the Ivory Coast, which is due to cease producing gold in 2021.
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