SMB Winning pays $15bn for rights to Guinea’s iron mountain
The Chinese-led consortium faces challenges to exploit one of the world’s biggest iron-ore deposits
WHEN PROSPECTORS discovered a gargantuan deposit of iron ore in the misty Simandou mountains 17 years ago, many Guineans hoped it would transform their impoverished country. The remote location makes its estimated 2.4bn tonnes of iron ore—valued at perhaps $230bn—hard to mine. Gyrating commodity prices scared off investment. So did lurid corruption scandals involving billionaires, government officials and mining companies.
This article appeared in the Business section of the print edition under the headline “Galvanised”
Business December 7th 2019
- Saudi Aramco’s IPO is the biggest ever
- SMB Winning pays $15bn for rights to Guinea’s iron mountain
- ArcelorMittal gets its fingers burned in Italy’s Ilva steel mill
- Mengniu Dairy gulps down two Australian milk producers
- Let them eat Christmas cake
- Alphabet turns a Page and a Brin
- The agonising dilemma of Spanish firms in Latin America
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