China's Winsway closer $1-bn Grand Cache Coal acquistion closure
13 Feb 2012
China's Winsway Coking Coal today said that it has received regulatory approval to seek a shareholders' meeting for its proposed $1-billion acquisition of Canadian coal miner Grand Cache Coal Corp.
Hong Kong-listed Winsway secured the stock exchange approval to send its formal bid proposal to a shareholder vote on 28 February.
Winsway, which supplies metallurgical coal to the Chinese steel industry had in November 2011 partnered Japan's Marubeni Corp yesterday to launch a friendly $1 billion bid for Canada's metallurgical coal producer Grande Cache Coal in order to meet the growing demand from steelmakers in China.
Alberta-based Grand Cache holds coal leases covering over 22,000 hectares containing an estimated 346 million tonnes of metallurgical coal resources in the Smoky River Coalfield located in west-central Alberta.
Grand Cache has been producing coal in the Smoky River Coalfield located since 2004 and utilises both surface and underground mining techniques that produce a premium, low volatile, metallurgical coal.
In December of 2009, Grand Cache announced plans for a strategic expansion to increase coal production to 3.5 million tonnes by 31 March 2013.