Rinehart rails
Australia’s richest person Gina Rinehart says the government should not be treating the mining industry as “an ATM”
According to a report in the Sydney Morning Herald in a video released ahead of today’s Australian Miners and Metals Conference in Melbourne, Rinehart says: “Let’s not be too proud to admit that we’re really just a large island with a small population with record debt.
“Plenty of Australians know this in a casual way but what few seem to properly understand, even people in government, is that mining and other resource industries aren’t just ATMs for people to draw from without that money first having to be earned and before that, giant investments made.”
Wealth fund worries
Sovereign wealth funds from resource-rich countries controlling more than $US500 billion of assets operate with no disclosure, limiting their accountability and increasing the risk of corruption, a transparency watchdog says.
The Financial Times reports the New York-based Revenue Watch Institute published research on Wednesday showing eight large funds, including the investment authorities of Qatar, Kuwait and Libya, disclosed no details about their assets, transactions or investments.
Several emerging economies also scored “satisfactory” grades, including Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Colombia.
The worst rated emerging economies for transparency were Iran, Qatar, Libya, Equatorial Guinea and Myanmar.
Patriot pay-off
A judge has ruled that Patriot Coal Corporation can pay $6.9 million in bonuses to key employees.
To those who came in late, Patriot filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last year. It has since been embroiled in legal battles over accusations it is trying to dodge its pension fund obligations.
According to Bloomberg US bankruptcy judge Kathy Surrat-States in St Louis granted the company permission to pay 274 people under two bonus plans.
The United Mine Workers of America, which represents 42% of Patriot’s workforce, objected, calling the payments “massive bonuses to corporate insiders” at a time when the company sought concessions from regular employees and claimed it was facing a liquidity crisis.
