Anglo-Australian BHP Billiton is on the lookout for acquisition opportunities but will not target greenfield projects in Latin America because their chances of success are less than in other areas, company CEO Chip Goodyear said at the inauguration of its Spence mine in Chile.
"The current market value of the company is about US$137bn," Goodyear told reporters in Santiago. "We have significant financial capability to carry out any corporate transaction that makes sense, but we are driven by value creation and not by size."
The US$1bn, 200,000t/y Spence mine is the first greenfield project to come into production in Chile in the last six years, according to the CEO.
In some cases the company has chosen to relinquish operations it does not consider crucial to the group's strategy, BHP Billiton base metals president Diego Hernández said at a press conference on Spence's inauguration.
BHP Billiton sold the Tintaya copper mine in Peru to London-listed Xstrata in 2006 for US$750mn because it was too small for the group's portfolio, Hernández said.
Tintaya churned out 78,318t of copper in concentrate, 40,093oz of gold in concentrate and 36,729t of copper cathode in 2006 compared to 73,927t, 32,553t and 35,491t respectively the previous year.
But that by no means signifies BHP Billiton is pulling out of Peru, Goodyear said, just out of greenfield efforts in that country. "A company like ours can't afford not to go where the resource is."
Goodyear declined to comment on rumors that BHP Billiton might be interested in taking over US aluminium company Alcoa.
The company head addressed BHP Billiton's copper price forecasts by saying he expected Chinese demand would not likely let up in the near-term, although the long-term outlook is what really drives the company's strategy.
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