BHP drops Anglo American bid again as rival rejects new proposal

BHP Group has walked away from a fresh takeover approach for Anglo American, ending an unexpected and short-lived attempt by the world’s largest miner to thwart a planned tie-up between its smaller rival and Canada’s Teck Resources.

BHP confirmed on Monday that it had held preliminary discussions with Anglo, but said it was now “no longer considering a combination of the two companies”.

The regulatory statement followed a Bloomberg News report on Sunday that BHP – which had already failed in a bid for Anglo last year – made a new overture in recent days. Anglo rejected that new approach, according to people familiar with the situation, having reviewed the proposal and decided that it was not superior to the combination with Teck. The people asked not to be named as the discussions were private.

BHP’s renewed interest speaks to pressures on an industry eager to add scale and growth, especially in copper, a metal where supply has been dwindling and demand is expected to rise as the world electrifies. The mining giant’s overture comes just weeks before shareholders from Anglo and Teck – two long-standing, copper-rich targets – are scheduled to vote on their own deal to create a company worth more than US$60 billion.

“Unease that a combined Anglo-Teck entity could slip out of reach as a future target” may have driven BHP’s second approach, Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Alon Olsha and Grant Sporre said, adding that a renewed bid would likely have caught shareholders off guard.