There's no way Swan and the Manchurian Candidate won't let the deal through, especially if they're going to impose conditions on Chinalco's plans for Rio.
If they block the OZ deal no one wins - the company would probably go bust, even more people would lose their jobs and the shareholders most likely would get nothing, or so little so far off in the future it wouldn't matter.
Inevitably some opportunist (probably an entrepreneur who knew the OZ mines backwards) would come along and pick up a couple of the old assets for a song from the banks. He'd then flog them back to the market in a float, probably under some wanky company name that included the word 'Phoenix'. And the punters would pile in again because "oooh, they're such good assets", and maybe they'd have better luck next time.
Bugger that. Too many people lose in the short term if the government blocks the Minmetals deal, and Rudd and co know it.
There are serious conflict-of-interest questions that AM should be facing - particularly about lobbying for the Minmetals deal when he sees it as the No.1 way to keep his own job. He won't though, mostly for all the same reasons.
OZL Price at posting:
$6.05 Sentiment: Hold Disclosure: Held
