Dutchman you write,

"I keep hearing things like NOT maybe has Vale or Xstrata already in but why on earth would these quys from Vale wait until the market becomes crazy and they have to buy out NOT for a large amount of money (compared to what it is worth now)"

It may be that these majors tied their own hands by way of a confidentiality agreement way back when NOT first discovered their rich nickel at Eagle one. If you have followed the progress of this company since then you should remember that several majors were given access to NOT's drilling results and likely other insider information. This was allowed because the majors wanted to see what NOT had. So again, we don't know what they had to sign at the time ,but it is possible and likely, that there was a guarantee not to take over NOT in a hostile take over.