News

February 04, 2010

Encanto Potash Moves One Step Closer To A Maiden Resource On The Muskowekwan Project In Saskatchewan

By Alastair Ford

All of a sudden the majors seem to be jockeying for position in potash. Late last month BHP Billiton announced that it is to acquire Athabasca Potash for C$341 million. A tidy enough sum, you might think, but one that was dwarfed by the US$3.8 billion that Vale has just paid for the South American fertilizer assets of US commodity supply chain company Bunge. At the same time as that deal was going through, Vale also announced that it had acquired a 16 per cent stake in Fertilizantes Fosfatados in Brazil. Vale’s got interests back in Saskatchewan too, and not far from Athabasca, where it continues to make progress developing its Regina project.

Meanwhile, BHP Billiton has also announced a US$240 million investment in its Jansen project, the borders of which run up against Athabasca’s ground, and which promises to be the world’s largest potash mine when it comes on stream in three or four years’ time. Into that heady mix comes wild talk of a possible bid from BHP Billiton for Canada’s largest Potash producer, Potash Corp. Of Saskatchewan, currently valued on the NYSE at around US$31 billion.

These are big moves by mighty fish in a...