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Natascha Viljoen, the South African mining engineer who runs Newmont Corp., the world's largest gold producer, disposed of 25,780 of her shares in the company worth about $2.9 million over four days in late October and early November.
Most of the shares went to the taxman. On Oct. 30, Newmont withheld 21,898 shares at $111.80 each, worth about $2.45 million, to cover taxes due on the vesting of 50,052 restricted stock units, according to a Form 4 filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on Nov. 3. On Nov. 2, Viljoen sold a further 3,882 shares at $108.04 apiece for about $419,400.
The sale was made under a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan she adopted on Feb. 23. Such plans let company insiders set up share sales in advance, at fixed times or prices, so they cannot be accused of trading on information the market does not have.
Regular sales
Viljoen has sold regular blocks of 3,882 shares under the plan since the middle of the year. She sold 3,882 shares at $105.32 on June 1, 7,764 shares on Aug. 5, 3,882 at $123 on Sept. 1 and 3,882 at $114.81 on Oct. 1. After the latest transactions she holds 101,691 Newmont shares directly. At the price of her Nov. 2 sale, the stake is worth about $11 million.
The filing comes less than two weeks after Newmont reported third-quarter results. The Denver-based company produced 1.3 million ounces of gold in the three months to September and earned net income of $2.5 billion, or $2.35 a share. It generated $1.9 billion of free cash flow and sold its gold at an average of $4,317 an ounce. Newmont said it had returned $1.9 billion to shareholders since its previous earnings call, including $1.6 billion in share buybacks, and declared a quarterly dividend of 26 cents a share.
"Newmont remains on track to achieve our full-year 2026 production guidance and improved full-year cost outlook," Viljoen said in the results statement on Oct. 22.
From Klerksdorp to Denver
Viljoen, who grew up in the mining town of Klerksdorp in South Africa's North West province, became Newmont's president and chief executive officer on Jan. 1, succeeding Tom Palmer. She is the first woman to lead the company, which runs gold and copper mines in North and South America, Africa, Australia and Papua New Guinea.
She began her career in 1991 as a trainee engineer at Iscor, the South African steel producer, and later worked in BHP's coal and chrome businesses and spent six years at platinum miner Lonmin, where she ran its processing division. She joined Anglo American in 2014 as group head of processing and became chief executive of Anglo American Platinum, now Valterra Platinum, in 2020. She moved to Newmont as chief operating officer in 2023 and was named president in May 2025.
Viljoen holds an engineering degree from North-West University and an executive MBA from the University of Cape Town.
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