LONDON — Mining group Anglo American Plc may be vulnerable to a potential takeover from rival Xstrata, Nomura said on Friday.

Anglo has ditched its previous conservative strategy, but the fruits of a new high-growth approach will not be seen for around two to three years since it has postponed three flagship projects, a research note said.

“Anglo may be facing an identity crisis that could leave the company vulnerable to takeover,” analyst Paul Cliff said.

“While BHP/Rio and Vale/Xstrata have attracted most of the M&A headlines in the sector recently, we would not rule out an Xstrata all-share offer or merger of equals with Anglo over the next 12 months.”

Assuming a 30 per cent takeover premium, a deal would be accretive to Xstrata in terms of earnings per share by 10 per cent in 2010 and 13 per cent in 2011, he added.

Anglo and Xstrata are the world's fourth and fifth biggest diversified mining groups by market value at $33-billion and $29.7-billion respectively.