SYDNEY Oct 16 Metals X on Friday made
an unsolicited bid for fellow Australia-listed miner Aditya
Birla Minerals, joining a growing number of companies
looking to increase their investments in copper production in
the country.

The all-stock offer valuing the target at around A$85
million ($60 million) pushed up Aditya Birla shares by as much
as 44 percent to A$0.26, putting them on track for their largest
single-day percentage gain since late 2009

A successful acquisition would give Metals X, predominately
a gold and tin miner, control of Aditya Birla’s sole operating
mine, Nifty, in Western Australia, which is forecast by the
company to yield between 24,000 and 27,000 tonnes of copper in
fiscal 2016.

Australian copper miners have been catching the eyes of
investors looking beyond the downward trajectory in metals
markets, with private investment giant KKR Co LP this
month taking a position in Oz Minerals.

That deal follows one last month where private investors,
ERM and Lighthouse Minerals, partnered to buy another copper
mine held by Aditya Birla, which is 51-percent owned by India’s
Hindalco Industries.

On a larger scale, Chinese state-owned investor Guangdong
Rising Assets Management (GRAM) in May completed a takeover of
PanAust Ltd after that company finalised a $125 million deal to
buy a copper project in Papua New Guinea.

Meanwhile, Glencore International last week put a copper
mine in Australia and another in Chile on the block in hopes of
attracting buyers.

Copper last week reached its highest since Sept. 18
at $5,356 a tonne.

Metals X is offering one of its shares for every five Aditya
Birla shares – equivalent to roughly $0.274 per Aditya Birla
share, a premium to the A$0.17 closing price on Thursday.

Aditya Birla said it would study the offer and advised its
shareholders not to take any action in the meantime.
($1 = 1.3704 Australian dollars)

(Reporting by James Regan; Editing by Joseph Radford)