The Chile Age article has got more attention than it really diserves
Australia's two big mining exports are iron ore and coal, both of which are mature industries. We have oodles of these resources in the ground and, with minor tweaking of current production and shipping infrastructure, we have the potential to overproduce. The Chinese would love us to overproduce so that they could buy iron ore and coal for vtwo bob.
Multinationals all have the same value: "that's make as much money as you can" yet when Australia wants to apply the very same principle to the resources we own, particuluarly iron ore and coal , they cry blue murder.
Imagine if BHP or RIO owned these resources how the would hold the rest of the world to ransome and pay us peanuts.
We have to be realistic here. When the governmennt, on our behalf, tries to extract the best profit from the sale of our minerals, it is accused of being socialist but when BHP tries to do the exact same for its shareholders it is considered comfortable capitalism.
Does Mercedes Benz overproduce its luxury line of car. You bet it doesn't and, for us, iron ore and coal ore our Benzs.
We have to make up our minds what and where our values are!
Our only real threat to iron ore investment and supply is Brazil and we realistically do not have a serious competitor in coal. The Chinese know this but we seem to miss the point. Vale is the biggest iron ore producer in the world and rather than prattle about the loss of foreign investment , we should be out there buying Vale rather than trying to chase uneconomic projects.If Australia as a country cant beat the multinationals then we should take a tip from China and join them!
How many mineral exploration cos on the ASX who are chronic cash burners and who have buckleys of being anything else yet these wannabees shout about RSPT depriving them from investment and we listen to them too! There's a pile.
As mentioned on an other thread, it does not make sense in iron ore and coal to oversupply the market and knock the bottom of price.
We should take a hint from OPEC who juggle this demand/supply/ price equation intelligently and and get the mix right; that's right for us and not the Chinese.
We should step back and consider, like the multinationals, how WE can make as much money as we can!
Moorooka Mick
Moorooka Mick is not an agent of: The Libs, Labor, The Nats, Pauline Hansen in Exile, Greens Socialists , Lunatic Right, Lunatic Left,Foreign Governments incl the Chinese, Miners, Billionaires or those who think that the Government is out to get them. He also has nothing whatsoever to do with The Royal Australian Association for the Preservation of the Fork....struth, mate!
