Murchison Sells Crosslands, Oakajee Port to Mitsubishi for $325 Million
Murchison Metals (ASX: MMX) has conditionally sold its interests in Crosslands Resources and the Oakajee Port and Rail projects to Mitsubishi Development for A$325 million.
With the sale, Murchison got a premium of 85 per cent of the company's last closing share price of A$0.275 at A$0.51 per share. The sale is conditioned on shareholders' approval in the next meeting in February 2012.
Murchison, based in Western Australia, also has the full flexibility to look for a superior proposal.
Once the transaction is completed, Murchison will no longer have ongoing exposure to the risks associated with the two ventures or be required to continue funding ongoing development. However, the firm will continue funding Crosslands and Oakajee through to completion as well as supporting interim budgets from January to March 2012 with an A$11.2 million net exposure cap.
Prior to the announcement of the conditional sale, Murchison voluntarily extended trading halt on its stock so it could go on with confidential and incomplete discussion with interested parties for the $5.94-billion Oakajee Rail and Port system and the $3.7-billion Crosslands iron-ore mining operation. .
Until the sale, Murchison held a 50 per cent stake in Crosslands Resources, which in turn owns half of the Oakajee Port & Rail project to be built 25 kilometres north of Geraldton. The other half of Crosslands is owned by Mitsubishi.