Mittal to invest $20 bn in steel plants in India

Steel tycoon Lakshmi Niwas Mittal has pledged an investment of about 20 billion dollars for building two 12-million-tonne steel plants in India, where the demand for the commodity is growing rapidly.

Arcelor Mittal, world's largest steelmaker, will spend 35 billion dollars on capacity expansion of steel plants across the world, the company CEO said in an interview with the Financial Times.

According to the report, Mittal believed that two plants in India made sense in a country where the demand for steel was growing fast, even though many in the industry had assumed that only one of the two projects would go ahead.

Read more in The Economic Times article.

Tatas likely to buy out Ryerson stake in TRyL

The Tatas are likely to buy out their partner, Ryerson Tull, US in their joint venture Tata Ryerson Ltd (TRyL).

The move follows Ryerson Tull, US putting itself up for sale in February after Harbinger Capital Partners, its single-largest shareholder, offered to transfer its holding to a slew of candidates to gain board control of the company. Several steel majors and private equity investors, including Arcelor Mittal, are believed to be interested in the steel solutions company.

Several companies have conducted due diligence prior to participating in an auction to gain controlling interest in Ryerson, reportedly valued at around $1.3 billion. Though no deadlines have been set for putting in firm bids, nor any timetable for concluding the auction, reports trickling in suggest that none of the bids was close to the desired valuation.

Read more in The DNA Money article.

Tata, Vietnam Steel sign $3 bn venture

Tata Steel Ltd, the world’s sixth-largest steel maker, and Vietnam Steel Corp. plan to spend $3.5 billion (Rs14,000 crore) on a steel-and-iron ore venture in the Southeast Asian nation to supply construction and shipping companies.

Tata Steel will hold 65% of the 4.5 million tonnes (mt) plant and 30% of the iron ore mine, making one of the biggest foreign direct investments in Vietnam, said managing director B. Muthuraman in Hanoi on Tuesday after signing the accord.

Tata Steel joins rivals such as Arcelor Mittal and Posco in seeking to expand in Asia, where steel usage is growing faster than in Europe and the US. Vietnam, with limited steel making capacity, imports half its annual 7mt requirement to supply shipping and construction companies that are expanding at 12% a year, according to the Mumbai-based firm.

Read more in The Livemint article.

Sterlite to raise $2 bn for power plant

Sterlite Industries (India), a unit of billionaire Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta Resources, plans to raise as much as $2 billion in its first share sale in the US to pay for a new power plant.

Sterlite, India’s largest copper producer, would sell shares that will trade on the New York Stock Exchange, the company said in a filing to the Securities & Exchange Commission.

By building a power plant, Agarwal is starting his second new venture three weeks after agreeing to pay $1.4 billion for 71 per cent of India’s biggest non-state iron-ore exporter. The response to the stock sale may show if he can achieve the goal of becoming one of the world’s top-five metals and mining companies.

Vedanta Resources, which owns 72 per cent of Sterlite, last month defeated rivals including Arcelor Mittal to buy Sesa Goa. The takeover gave the company its first iron ore mine in India, where steel demand is growing at almost twice the global average fuelled by the world’s second-fastest pace of growth.

Read more in The Business Standard article.