Wednesday July 2, 06:35 PM
Talbot Group buys 19% stake in US miner [at Financial Times]
By Elizabeth Fry in Sydney
Talbot Group, Ken Talbot's private investment company, has paid $190m for a 19.9 per cent stake in PBS Coals, a privately-held Pennsylvania coal miner. The purchase follows a progressive sell down of his 19.8 per cent stake in Macarthur
Coal to steelmakers ArcelorMittal (Amsterdam: NSCNL0001MT7.AS - news) and Posco (005490.KS - news) . In the past few days, he has reduced his holding to 4.76 per cent. Macarthur Coal supplies more than a third of the world's pulverised coal. It was floated in 2001 out of a company called Australian Premium Coals, which Mr Talbot founded in 1997. Mr Talbot, whose net worth is estimated at about A$1.2bn (US$1.15bn), is building a global mining empire with assets in Australia, Africa, and Asia. The PBS Coals deal marks his first foray into North America. Talbot Group owns stakes in a variety of listed Australian resource companies including Goldminex Resources, Marathon Resources, Sundance Resources, Queensland Ores and Karoon Gas. It spent about A$103m in May to buy a 5.97 per cent stake in Riversdale Mining which is developing a hard-coking and thermal coal project in Mozambique with Tata Steel, India's largest steelmaker. PBS produced about 2m tonnes of metallurgical coal in the past year. The plan is for it to list on the Toronto Stock Exchange in August by way of a reverse takeover through a listed shell called Penfold Capital Acquisition (PNA-P.V - news) . Mr Talbot discovered PBS through long-time Macarthur Coal shareholder Sprott Resources, a Canadian fund manager and a 37 per cent shareholder in PBS. Talbot Group said it was interested in coalfields in the eastern US because of the available infrastructure and attractive reserves. Robert Scott, president of PBS, said he was "delighted" that the Talbot Group had decided to become a strategic investor in PBS, and "we look forward to continuing to build PBS with the addition of its deep expertise in the coal industry". Mr Talbot, 57, will become a director of PBS.
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