Anglo American Rejects BHP Takeover Bid

What has Anglo American said? Yeah, I mean Tom not surprisingly they have as you mentioned unanimously rejected the proposal. But the statement is really telling if we just read part of it, they said the BHP proposal is opportunistic and fails to value Anglo Americans prospects while significantly diluting the relative value upside participation of Anglo American shareholders relative to BHP shareholders calling it unattractive, highly unattractive is what they they say and also noting the fact that it would create a lot of uncertainty, which has been a lot of the discussion. Around this proposed deal since we first found out about it on Thursday. So now the question is what does BHP do next? And as you mentioned, a lot of the discussion too is about how is South Africa and the South African government and and the shareholders here particularly particularly going to respond to what is a very complicated structure with this company. And Jen, you’re you’re there in Joburg, what has the South African response been to this takeover bid? Well, I think what’s important to note is that South Africa State Pension Fund is one of the biggest shareholders in Anglo and of course Anglo is very significant to the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. And the the BHP proposal as you may have noted at the top of the show is is hinges on the fact that BHP wants Anglo to spin off the South African assets. Anglo has a storied history in this country, employs thousands of people. And Anglo has already been going through job cuts and restructuring. And so the question is what happens next? We actually heard from Gwen Montage, who we spoke with a few weeks ago. About the elections, but you know, he’s saying that he is not in favor of BHP’s bid for Anglo. He says he’s not speaking on behalf of the government, but saying that his experience with BHP in the past. Has not been positive. And we also heard from the state pension fund and noting how critical the South African mining is to the economy and really to all the stakeholders and the jobs that it creates in the country. It’s also a major export for South Africa. So this is very complicated and will likely face a lot of scrutiny from all players. So we’re going to have to pay close attention to really how, how this evolves.