http://www.forexyard.com/en/news/Kalahari-confident-as-deadline-f...

http://www.forexyard.com/en/news/Kalahari-confident-as-deadline-for-Chinese-bid-looms-2011-04-28T105354Z-UPDATE-1

Kalahari confident as deadline for Chinese bid looms

Saturday April 30, 2011 06:53:10 AM GMT [???]

* Kalahari chairman says confident deal will go through

* Kalahari shares trading at 230p, below 290p CGNPC offer

* Deadline for CGNPC bid is 5 p.m. (1600 GMT) on May 3 * CGNPC declines to comment

LONDON, April 28 (Reuters) - Uranium miner Kalahari Minerals is confident it will seal a deal with state-owned suitor China Guangdong Nuclear Power (CGNPC), despite worries over the takeover price that have held back its shares.

"I am confident in CGNPC. They need uranium, and they want to do the deal," Executive Chairman Mark Hohnen told Reuters.

"I am confident the deal will go through."

He said the two sides had held "commercial discussions" but declined to comment on whether the Chinese had proposed a price cut in the light of Japan's Fukushima nuclear disaster that has prompted Europe, the United States and China to review uranium reactor programmes.

By May 3, under an agreed plan, CGNPC has to either formalise the offer, which would hand resource-hungry China a stake in one of the world's largest uranium mines, agree with Kalahari to extend the bid or scrap negotiations over the deal

The original proposal -- announced last month just days before the Fukushima nuclear reactor was crippled by an earthquake and tsunami -- was backed by Kalahari management and values the company at 756 million pounds ($1.26 billion).

That represents a 25 percent premium to the current market value, reflecting concerns the Chinese could be seeking to renegotiate the price.

CGNPC declined to comment.

(Reporting by Clara Ferreira-Marques; Additional reporting by Wan Xu; Editing by Will Waterman) ($1=.6003 Pound)