Noble

Noble: 64.46% owned Gloucester Coal has been approached by Yancoal Australia (a unit of China’s Yanzhou Coal Mining) to form a merger which will result in a combined value up to A$8.0b. The acquisition price is purported to be approx A$2.0b, a 43% premium to Gloucester’s mkt cap. Gloucester last traded at A$7.03 with total mkt cap of A$1.4b and has fallen 43.1% YTD. As of now no official details or pricing has been revealed.

Yancoal Australia is required to float at least 30% of its Australian assets by 2012 after acquiring Felix Resources in 2009 and was considering a reverse take over to fulfill the requirements. Yancoal Australia is currently privately held. Its parent, Yanzhou Coal Mining is listed in HK.

Gloucester has issued a statement to ASX requesting a trading halt until 22 Dec, Thursday in relation to a possible control transaction with no other official details. Noble’s shareholders had earlier in Apr voted against a merger bid by Macarthur Coal. The avg premium paid globally for coal assets this yr is 19%