Murchison Bid for Midwest Expires

Murchison Metals Ltd has thrown in the towel in its $900 million takeover bid for Midwest Corporation Ltd. The company has however said it would not be averse to a counter offer by its rival.

Murchison managing director Trevor Matthews told reporters that the company would also consider a scrip-based merger as their shareholders would still participate in a much bigger asset base and a much bigger, more certain development.

Murchison's bid expired on Tuesday, leaving it with a 4.8% stake.

Matthews also said that the company was considering divesting its stake in Midwest but cast doubt over the success of China's Sinosteel Corporation bid. Sinosteel has offered to buy Midwest for $1.19 billion. Murchison closed up two cents to $3.98, while Midwest finished down 17 cents to $4.95.

Global engineering services provider, Ausenco Limited today announced that it has agreed to acquire multi-discipline engineering services business, the Pipeline Systems Incorporated group.

PSI has the leading global position in the design and delivery of slurry pipeline transport systems including long distance slurry pipelines and tailings disposal systems. The acquisition complements Ausenco's mining and minerals processing engineering services business and provides diversification into the process infrastructure-engineering sector.

Australian Dollar - Unchanged

The dollar closed firmer but off its overnight highs as today's interest rate hike by the domestic central bank garnered little response from investors. At the close the Australian dollar was trading at US$0.9074/77, up from yesterday's close of US$0.9047/52.