"Can anyone think of a better buy in the blue chip arena than...

"Can anyone think of a better buy in the blue chip arena than BHP ?"

I tend to not visit BHP threads, but I stumbled across your question, and couldn't help replying.

Personally, I think this is a very average company.

If a Martian investor landed on earth for the first time, and had never heard of BHP, and someone said to him,

"I have an investment opportunity for you. It's a business that is capital-intensive, produces purely commoditised goods over which it has no pricing power and its asset life is finite. Oh, and there is much precedent for its managers being notoriously poor stewards of capital by making value-destructive acquisitions from time to time."

I'm not sure that Martian investor would be chomping at the bit to become an owner of such a business.

I think this company, and indeed the resources sector, is currently over-earning significantly and almost exclusively due to circumstances over which it has had zero influence.

(I don't want to start one of those tit-for-tat, on-line arguments; I don't even seek to influence your opinion. And nothing you can respond with will be able to change my opinion. I am simply offering my contrarian opinion on a company that everyone seems to love, but which I think is flawed in terms of long-term wealth creation for its owners.)