The Herald Sun: Whole new ball game
A key note to the Guinea government: Next time you want to nationalize something, wait for the rail line to be built. I mean seriously, if you are going to take Rio Tinto, do it right. Get them to invest at least 1-2 billion in capital and get some extra added value. Taking a project after a resource has been established and a feasibility study is done is rather short-sighted in these trying economic times. It is much better to let them sink some capital into the project first, as once you have nationalized the asset you have to come up with the money to develop it. Or maybe you already have another deal. China and Mittal both come to mind as groups who would be willing to follow in Rio Tinto’s footsteps.
When you discount African or Russian assets, discount with a huge margin. But then again, with Obama coming to power, if you own American resource assets, you could be facing partial “nationalization” in a windfall tax. If I am not mistaken, everyone wants to take from the rich resource companies and give to themselves.
Isn’t greed great?
