Boardroom split at BHP over Anglo deal?

Anglo American last week rejected a £31 billion takeover offer by its bigger rival BHP, complaining that the deal was “highly unattractive” with “significant execution risks.”

Surprisingly though, that view is also shared among some senior members of BHP, it would appear.

After a bit of digging on LinkedIn, Spy struck gold. The company’s CTO, Johan van Jaarsveld, liked a post describing the deal as “senseless” and “value destructive.”

“It looks like the investment bankers have had a quiet spell and [are] dreaming up deals that may make sense on paper, but are not in the long-term interests of BHP,” the post read, adding that the firm should “reject the senseless M&A that was so value destructive in the past.”

If even the BHP board isn’t on board with this deal, its chances of success seem pretty slim. But maybe the firm will dig deep and come back with a better offer.

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