To cricket-loving executives at Rio Tinto, a tilt at Riversdale Mining must feel like smacking a slow ball out of the ground after a long winter spent practising indoors. The US$3.5bn approach may well come to nothing: to win Riversdale, Rio would need the support of steelmakers Tata and CSN, which are both big strategic shareholders in the target. But the fact that the Anglo-Australian miner is weighing a bid at all suggests it has emerged from its post-Alcan funk.
對喜歡打板球的力拓(Rio Tinto)高管而言,對Riversdale礦業(Riversdale Mining)的收購想必感覺很像經歷了漫長的冬日室內練習之后,啪的一聲將一個慢球擊出場外。力拓開價35億美元收購Riversdale的嘗試很可能會無果而終:要成功贏得Riversdale,力拓需要鋼鐵制造商塔塔(Tata)和巴西國家黑色冶金公司(CSN)的支持,而這兩者都是Riversdale的重要戰略股東。但力拓畢竟是在考慮競購,這個事實表明,這家英澳礦商已經從收購加拿大鋁業(Alcan)后的恐慌情緒中復元。