xtrata article....good read, page-2

Extract for the lazy....but you should read the article!

Typically a discreet investor, Qatar has shattered its "dumb money" reputation by threatening to sink the latest effort to merge Xstrata with its top shareholder with a decision to vote against the bid at a meeting on Friday. It has a 12 percent stake it is expected to increase over time.

Certainly, Xstrata's position has advantages.

It is the only one of the five large diversified mining companies without exposure to steelmaking ingredient iron ore, where prices have slumped. It also has the biggest proportional exposure to copper - a metal expected to benefit from scarce supply and where the value of undeveloped resources is rising, not falling, as for some commodities.

"Companies with big copper resources, with copper growth are somewhat unique - at one point, Xstrata had 20 percent of probable global production growth for the next 10 years," analyst Chris LaFemina at Jefferies said.

"The asset quality is mixed, but they have substantial growth, and diversified peers do not."

Xstrata - which began its current incarnation in a JP Morgan basement, with the $2.5 billion acquisition of Glencore coal assets - was dreamt up as a new-style, nimble miner that would scoop up unwanted deposits from majors and turn them into lean, profitable enterprises.