UK mining giant Anglo American ditches De Beers to save itself from £34billion takeover
DIAMONDS are no longer mining firm Anglo American’s best friend — as it ditches De Beers.
The move comes in a bid to save itself from a £34billion takeover.
Just one day after revealing it had rejected a sweetened bid from Australian-listed BHP, Brit giant Anglo American revealed its own radical break-up plan.
Boss Duncan Wanblad yesterday unveiled the scheme to simplify the business and focus on its highly-prized copper mines and iron ore.
BHP’s bid has shocked bosses into a long-awaited shake-up.
Anglo American will spin-off or sell its De Beers diamond business, which has become increasingly volatile due to a luxury market slowdown and the rise of lab-grown versions.
De Beers, whose latest ad campaign features actress Lupita Nyong’o, has 2,400 jewellery shops worldwide.
Analysts said De Beers — once responsible for 85 per cent of the world’s mined diamonds — could be worth as much as £4.25billion. If it was listed in London, De Beers would be a FTSE 100 company in its own right.
Anglo American is also going to exit its South African platinum Amplats business and is delaying the opening of its giant Woodsmith fertiliser mine in Whitby, Yorkshire.
The business will scale back spending from £790million a year to just £158million.
Shrinking company assets could make the business more bite-size for BHP — or another suitor. But Mr Wanblad said that by the time the restructuring was complete in 2025, Anglo American “is going to be extremely highly valued — to the extent that anybody who wants to buy us is going to have to pay an enormous price”.
Anglo American has said BHP’s bid of £27.53 a share undervalues the company but yesterday its shares fell by 3.49 per cent to £26.12.
BAKING A PROFIT
WET weather has not dampened Brits’ appetites for sausage rolls and other bakery goods as Greggs celebrated a strong start to 2024.
The firm recorded a 7.4 per cent rise in sales for the 20 weeks to May.
Despite people staying home in the soggy conditions during March and April, its JustEat and Uber deliveries made sure customers were still able to get their Greggs fix.
Greggs now has 2,500 stores across the UK, with sales of £693million, and has plans to open a further 160 this year.
STAMP BOOTY
THE boss of betting giant Flutter has called on the Government to abolish stamp duty on share trading if it wants to revive the London Stock Exchange.
Flutter, which owns Paddy Power, is shifting its listing to New York this month as the US is now the biggest part of the business.
But it is another blow for the LSE which has been hit by an exodus of companies.
Flutter chief Peter Jackson said scrapping stamp duty would make trading in London more attractive, boost the number of shares being traded, and raise valuations.
The duty is fixed at 0.5 per cent of an asset when buying and selling shares.
Flutter posted a 16 per cent rise in revenues to £2.6billion. Losses widened to £141million after writing down some takeovers.
The firm revealed it took nearly 35million bets at the Cheltenham Festival, losing £3million on Slade Steel.
ENERGY BILL JOY
CHEAPER energy deals could be on the market by autumn, it was revealed yesterday.
Ofgem is lifting its ban on “acquisition tariffs” — exclusive less costly offers banned during the energy crisis when several suppliers went bust.
Prices have since fallen sharply and new contracts should fuel competition and cut household bills.
Consumer champion Martin Lewis welcomed the move. He said suppliers currently had “no incentive” to charge less, typically offering contracts close to the price cap.
TESCO’S £10M PAY FOR BOSS
TESCO chief executive Ken Murphy bagged £9.9million last year, a record pay day for a supermarket boss.
It is more than double his £4.4million award last year and 433 times the average salary for Tesco’s lowest-paid staff.
Defending the payout, Tesco said it hit “stretching targets in a highly competitive sector” and had created value for customers.
But Luke Hildyard, of fair pay campaigners the High Pay Centre, said: “You couldn’t really get a better indicator of how the UK economy serves the interests of the super-rich at the expense of everybody else than this.”
The grocer doubled operating profits to £2.8billion last year and grew revenues by four per cent to £68.2billion.
Mr Murphy said it is the most competitive it had ever been after cutting 4,000 prices and boosting Clubcard discounts.
It has also increased staff hourly pay to £12.02.
'MORE TO BE DONE' AT VODA
VODAFONE’S boss says “much more needs to be done” to turn the firm around despite it making growth in key markets.
Margherita Della Valle said 5,000 out of 11,000 job cuts have been made in moves to “rightsize” the telecom giant.
Service revenue has grown by 6.3 per cent to £25.7billion over the last year and customer numbers are up. Voda is still in “deep conversations” about a Three Mobile tie-up.
Profits fell to £3.1billion from £12.5billion — but the latter figure got a £7.4billion boost by selling a signal towers firm.
BIDEN TAX ON CHINA
US president Joe Biden has ramped up tariffs on cheap Chinese electric vehicles from 25 per cent to 100 per cent.
It comes after China’s BYD electric car brand briefly overtook America’s Tesla in car sales at the end of last year.
Biden accused China of “flooding global markets with artificially low-priced exports”.
His measures also target semiconductors, batteries, solar cells and minerals — all used in “green” technologies.