"We remain convinced that the ongoing industrialisation and urbanisation of China and other developing economies is still at a relatively early stage and will continue to drive strong long-term demand for our products,” he said.
BHP chief executive Marius Kloppers said even in currently turbulent economic conditions, the future of the business remained positive.
“While we fully expect some reverberations from global economic shocks in the short and medium term, we remain focused on meeting growing customer demand in the long term,” Mr Kloppers said.
He said BHP was ready to pounce on opportunities when they arise.
“Projects cannot really be financed at the moment by small companies, and you see their share prices reflect that,” he said.
“As that cash tightness progresses – we’re already seeing these junior companies have share prices that are now back to where they were perhaps five years ago - certainly in theory there should be some opportunities to take advantage of and since we have the money that’s obviously the case.”
AGO Price at posting:
66.0¢ Sentiment: Hold Disclosure: Held
