Johannesburg - Gold Fields Ltd said the US Securities and Exchange Commission, which probed the producer’s sale of a stake in its South Deep mine under a South African programme to expand black ownership, recommended no enforcement action be taken.
The SEC provided the notice under guidelines in a section of the Securities Act Release No. 5310, which states that the notice “must in no way be construed as indicating that the party has been exonerated or that no action may ultimately result from the staff’s investigation”, the Johannesburg-based company said in a statement on monday.
In August 2010, Gold Fields agreed to issue 600 000 shares to a black-owned group and allowed it to buy 10 percent of South Deep, the world’s largest gold deposit after Grasberg in Indonesia.
Local law requires mining companies to sell or cede 26 percent of their operations to black citizens.
The SEC investigated the transaction in the US, where investors trade Gold Fields via American depositary receipts.
Bloomberg