BHP, Rio confident of Asian interest
Australia’s two largest mining companies are confident Asian demand for iron ore will remain strong, leading to healthy returns for low-cost producers of the steel-making material, according to the Australian Financial Review.
Rio Tinto chief executive Sam Walsh has defended plans to spend up to $US5 billion on further expansions of its mining operations in the Pilbara despite its largest independent shareholder, BlackRock, and other large institutional investors expressing doubts.
BHP Billiton’s new chief executive, Andrew Mackenzie, said customers in North Asia were counting on Australia “big time” for the ongoing supply of iron ore, gas, coal, copper and nickel.
Miners need certainty before investing
Mining companies prefer stable investment climates because they are in an inherently weak negotiating position relative to the governments of countries in which they operate, says Rio Tinto chairman Jan du Plessis.
“We go to a particular country, we dig a big hole, we set up a mining operation, we build a railway line, we build a harbour and a port, we invest often billions of dollars in infrastructure, in fixed assets,” he said after Rio’s annual meeting in Sydney yesterday.
“We can’t take those assets and run with it. Once we have made those commitments, to some extent in our relationship with government, we feel quite exposed. We need absolute certainty before we go into countries to make those sorts of investments.”
Du Plessis was speaking broadly about Rio’s projects around the world rather than a specific development.
Maitland lined up job for Macdonald’s daughter: ICAC
A corruption inquiry has heard former union leader John Maitland helped secure a job in China for then NSW Labor mining minister Ian Macdonald’s daughter as an alleged pay-off for the minister having given him a lucrative coal exploration licence, according to the Australian Financial Review.
The former national secretary of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union admitted on his third day in the Independent Commission Against Corruption witness box that he had used his connections to get Sasha Macdonald a job in early 2009.
But he denied yesterday that he did so “as a quid pro quo” for Macdonald’s decision, which conferred a financial windfall on Maitland and his associates.
