The Globe and Mail reports in its Saturday edition that the gold mining sector is being rocked by a round of mergers and acquisitions that is widely expected to pick up steam. The Globe's Andrew Willis writes that what is missing from the current round of deal-making is the premium prices that defined past takeovers. Precious metals stocks are market darlings because the price of gold is soaring on fears of a pandemic-induced economic downturn and currency-debasing inflation. The last time bullion prices tested these historic highs, a decade ago, a number of mining chief executive officers binged on wealth-destroying deals. Companies such as Barrick and Kinross Gold acquired rivals at premium prices -- 20 to 30 per cent above where the target company's stock was trading -- then spent years dealing with the financial hangover. "This bull cycle in gold mining M&A is different from what we've experienced in the past," said Jim Meloche at investment bank Origin Merchant Partners. "Because many historical takeovers played out in the past with significant premiums for target companies and then followed by large writedowns for buyers, transactions with no to low premiums might become the new norm for this cycle."