Business Description:
AngloGold Ashanti Limited (AGG) is a gold producer, listed on the Johannesburg, London, Paris, Brussels, Ghana and New York stock exchanges. The South African based company has a broad geographic spread of operations, sourcing production from Africa, Australia, South America and North America.

Strategy Analysis:
The focus of AGG is to continuously build upon its resource base supported by its greenfields pipeline. The company also aims to grow assets that have clearly defined capital and operating costs and significant resources and reserves. If assets do not meet these criteria they are fixed or sold. The last few years have seen AGG reduce costs, boost production and eliminate their hedge book as they seek to benefit from the high gold price. Two areas of concern are the number of miner fatalities, which highlights the need for OH&S improvements, and South African power reliability (increased costs), which is critical to the operations of AGG. AngloGold Ashanti provided its September 2011 quarterly activities report, reporting record adjusted headline earnings (AHE) of $457m, or 118 US cents a share, up 51% year-on-year; net profit attributable to equity shareholders of $456m; quarterly cash inflow from operations more than doubled to $863m year-on-year; quarterly free cash flow of $300m after capex, finance costs, tax and translation impacts; net debt declined by 28% to $620m; AHE and cash inflow from operations for 9 months ended 30 September 2011 above $1bn and $2bn respectively; and total cash costs of $737/oz, well within guidance - production marginally up on previous quarter at 1.092Moz.