News

July 21, 2008

That Was The Week Was … In Australia

By Our Man in Oz

Minews. Good morning Australia. Or is it…?

Oz. Well it’s not a good morning for most investors down this way, and it’s a dreadful morning for retiring Oxiana (OXR) boss, Owen Hegarty. Not only has he seen the share price of the company he created crumble alarmingly, but on Friday he suffered the absolute indignity of having his retirement pay rejected by shareholders. Technically, the A$10.6 million termination package was never put to the vote at Oxiana’s annual meeting, but a count of proxies showed that more than half voted against the deal, and that caused Hegarty to withdraw the motion at the meeting.

Minews. That sounds like fairly harsh treatment for the man who made the company.

Oz. It was, but it was also a measure of the anger about how Oxiana’s merger with the big zinc miner, Zinifex (ZFX), has turned it into a business dominated by zinc, the weakest of the base metals. Since last November Oxiana’s share price has crashed from A$4.32 to a close on Friday of A$1.96, down 54.6 per cent in eight months. Most of the blame lies in the increased exposure to zinc, which has fallen from...