Goldcorp puts Los Filos mine in Mexico on block, eyes other sales

Goldcorp Inc has put its Los Filos gold and silver mine in Mexico on the block and is also looking at selling two other non-core mines, chief executive David Garofalo said on Thursday.

Vancouver-based Goldcorp has started a formal sales process for the Los Filos mine, Garofalo said in an interview, and it is looking at options for its Alumbrera mine in Argentina and its Marlin operation in Guatemala, both of which are getting close to being mined out.

"Los Filos, Marlin and Alumbrera are smaller scale mines. They don't have the economies of scale that our existing five camps offer us" or that a newly acquired gold project, Coffee, "potentially offers us once it's built out," Garofalo said.

At Marlin, opportunity for significant exploration exists that might attract a small mining explorer, Garofalo said. Alumbrera's mine site infrastructure could be of value to owners of some of the nearby undeveloped deposits.

Garofalo would not speculate on a sales value for any of the assets but said Goldcorp would be happy to be paid in part in the shares of the acquirer, as happened in 2010 when it sold its Escobal silver deposit to Tahoe Resources Inc.

Goldcorp acquired a 40 percent stake in Tahoe through that deal. It later sold its stake for around US$1 billion.

"We like supporting new generation producers like that and we'd be happy to do something like that with any of these assets," Garofalo said.