Miners Keep Pressure on Gillard in Australia

Mayank Mehta, Chandrasekhar Atreya and Sanjay Barot
25 Jun, 2010
New York City

Stocks in Australia continue to decline. Prime Minister Julia Gillard offered to negotiate with miners but the industry took cautious view. BG Group gets approval for LNG project in Queensland. Extract Resources is on track to develop world

[R]6:00 PM Sydney, Australia – Stocks in Australia continue to decline. Prime Minister Julia Gillard offered to negotiate with miners but the industry took cautious view. BG Group gets approval for LNG project in Queensland. Extract Resources is on track to develop world’s largest uranium mine in Namibia. Coal & Allied looks to sell Oaklands deposit.[/R]

Australian stocks continued to decline for the fourth consecutive day today echoing Asian market sentiments. The ASX 200 index in Australia decreased 66.70 or 1.49% to close at 4,413.00.

Julia Gillard launched her leadership as Australia’s first woman Prime Minister with a conciliatory tone towards the mining industry.

“My priority is to deal with the mining tax. It has caused uncertainty and that in turn has caused anxiety. I want to make sure that Australian’s get a fair share of our mineral wealth, but I want to genuinely negotiate,” Gillard told reporters in Canberra today.

Australia’s Prime Minister should show her good faith by removing the anticipated revenue from the proposed super profit tax in her budget before initiating talks with the miners, said Macarthur Coal Ltd.

“It is not possible to negotiate in good faith with a big hairy monster like that peeping over your shoulder, and in return the mining industry would be fair in its desire to negotiate terms of the deal,” said Keith de Lacy, Chairman of the Brisbane-based company in its statement today.

BG Group Plc has got approval for its LNG project from Queensland after a review of the statement provided by the firm on the project’s environmental impact.

“The government approval for the A$15 billion project is expected by the middle of the year,” QGC Pty Ltd, the Australian unit of BG Group, said in a statement today. The construction can begin only after getting production licenses, safety approvals and other environmental permits, the unit said in its statement.

BG Group’s Queensland Curtis venture is expected to generate more than 5,000 jobs during construction and will initially produce some 8.5 million tons of LNG a year, with first exports targeted for 2014.

The prospects of Perth-based Extract Resources Ltd for the Rossing South uranium project in Namibia appear bright

“Extract is in a unique position, with the development of Rossing South on track to become one of the largest, stand alone uranium mines in the world. We expect production levels of 15 million pounds of uranium oxide per year,” Stephen Galloway, Chairman of Extract said after the general meeting of the company on June 22.

ASX Movers

Riversdale Mining Limited led gainers in the S&P ASX 200 index with a rise of 1.1% followed by Macarthur Coal Limited 2.7%, United Group Limited 0.9% and BHP Billiton plc 2.1%.

Macquarie Group Limited led decliners in the S&P ASX 200 index with a loss of 3.0% followed by Orica Limited 1.1%, Perpetual Limited 0.6%, Caltex Australia Limited 6.7% and Westpac Banking Corporation 1.8%.

Other Movers

Atlas Iron Limited dropped 2.2% to A$2.1.

BHP Billiton plc dropped 2.3% to A$38.73 as world commodities prices eased on the worries that global economic recovering may be uneven and protracted.

Macarthur Coal Limited, the exporter of pulverized coal, gained 2.7% to A$12.00.

Qantas Airways Limited fell 1.6% to A$2.32 after the airline said a long-running dispute over working conditions with Qantas engineers has ended amicably.

Rio Tinto Limited fell 3.0% to A$69.57 after Coal & Allied controlled by Rio Tinto is looking to sell its undeveloped Oaklands coal deposit in Australia, the company said on Thursday.