Published: November 26 2010 09:25 | Last updated: November 26 2010 20:35
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Rio Tinto was looking at a number of possible acquisitions in the "low-single-digit billion" price range, the miner said on Friday, as booming sales of iron ore continued to erase recent memories of indebtedness and forced asset sales.
Rio, riding a China-generated wave of high industrial metals prices, expects to spend about $11bn (7bn) on building and expanding mines in 2011, up from about $4bn this year. Annual capital expenditure is likely to remain "at a comparable level" to $11bn during the next few years
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Guy Elliott, finance director, confirmed that Rio was on the hunt for acquisitions as it finished a year defined by asset disposals.
"We are looking strongly at M&A," he said, but scoffed at the notion of a target "anywhere near" the size of Alcan, its ill-fated $40bn aluminium buy. "We are not looking at huge acquisitions. I would say they are in the low-single-digit billions. But we do see some things out there. What we pursue will be businesses that have synergies with ones we already own."
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