Ya never know what may happen during negotiations. All they had to do was reach a deal that was acceptable for all and we could have avoided all this public bantering. Now Cliffs is seen as the big bully attempting to strong arm the little guy. Well, we know they have been talking and that Cliff's wants the BDD. Going to get very interesting I think...

Link: http://www.miningweekly.com/article/merged-kwg-spider-would-likely-focus-on-exports-for-chromite-project-2010-06-04

High grades at Big Daddy project might cut processing requirements

TALKS ALL ROUND

Although the news only broke in the last couple of weeks, discussions had been under way with both Cliffs and Spider for some time, Smeenk said in an interview this week.

In fact, the negotiations with Cliffs got more “enthusiastic” in the last month or so, he said, but the parties could not agree on a valuation and so Cliffs opted to let the market decide whether its price was good enough.

With Spider, talks had been going on for more than a decade, which is about as long as the two companies have been working together in the Ring of Fire, and shareholders in both companies have responded positively to the merger plan, Smeenk asserted.

“By and large our shareholders and Spider shareholders are thrilled. I think it's self-evident that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.”

Cliffs launched its formal offer for Spider Resources this week. Because the US company has a stake in KWG, the offer is a related party transaction, and so KWG must first obtain an independent valuation report on the company. It announced on Thursday it has hired Cormark Securities to do the work.

Smeenk said there is always a possibility that something friendly could be negotiated with Cliffs, but said that there are no talks under way at the moment.

Spider's Hamelin declined to comment on whether the company would consider negotiations with Cliffs.