The chief executive officer of Barrick Gold Corp. said recent takeover deals in the gold-mining sector have been “over the top,” adding that the Toronto-based company will not be making any acquisitions that don’t make financial sense.

In an interview on Wednesday, Mark Bristow was asked about the wave of mergers and acquisitions in the industry over the last few months.

“Everyone thought we were going to do something stupid in the last quarter – we didn’t do that,” said Bristow.

“We’re very focused on a disciplined approach to any M&A – we’re not shy on doing deals that create value for our stakeholders, but we are guided very clearly by our investment focus and we are disciplined in that manner.”

Bristow said he thinks “recent M&A transactions have been ‘over the top,’ and certainly not at a level where we felt we could deliver real value.”

On Wednesday morning, Barrick released its fourth-quarter financial results. The miner reported a profit of 35 cents U.S. per share, which topped the average analyst estimate. The company’s revenue for the quarter came in at US$3.31 billion.

Barrick also announced an 11 per cent dividend increase on Wednesday morning, as well as a plan to buy back as much as US$1 billion of its shares over the next 12 months.