The mining boom has made a fortune for Fortescue founder Andrew Forrest but a slowdown in China would present big problems for his industry. Photo / Thinkstock
Neville Power gazes out the window of a chartered jet at the rust-red, mineral-rich Australian Outback.
Power is the new chief executive of Fortescue Metals, a mining company whose one-time penny stock has soared in value almost 1200-fold in nine years as a result of China's insatiable hunger for Australian iron ore. Fortescue's share price surge has lifted the firm into the ranks of the world's 500 biggest companies.
Even though the share price plunged 28 per cent this year, an investment of A$10,000 in Fortescue stock in November 2002 would be worth nearly A$12 million today. The 31.5 per cent stake of chairman Andrew Forrest, who took control in 2003, is worth A$4.6 billion.
Power says he is not resting on past successes. He says Fortescue is spending US$8.4 billion to triple production to 155 million tonnes by 2013.
"When we reach that target, we'll be as big in iron ore as BHP is today," Power says, referring to BHP Billiton, the world's largest mining company.
Such lofty ambitions are cutting both ways for Australia, if not for Fortescue. The nation of 22.7 million people sprinkled over a land mass the size of the continental United States is in the grip of its biggest mining boom since a mid-19th century gold rush.
While delivering record profits for miners, surging demand for Australia's minerals sent the local currency soaring to its highest level in 30 years. It has also forced the Government to keep the benchmark interest rate at 4.75 per cent, the highest in the developed world.
The combined impact of a rising currency and such high borrowing costs has crippled manufacturers, retailers and other non-mining industries. It has also helped to destabilise Prime Minister Julia Gillard's Government, which clings to power by a single parliamentary seat.
Even for miners, the boom carries risks because of the industry's potentially dangerous overdependence on a single customer.
According to Australian government statistics, the country is already the world's No 1 exporter of iron ore, coal and alumina. It ranks second in gold, zinc and lead production; fourth in nickel and silver; and sixth in copper.
Now, companies such as Rio Tinto, BHP and Fortescue are pouring US$174 billion into new projects. Some 40 per cent of those minerals are sold to China.
Chinese steelmakers buy more than 95 per cent of Fortescue's iron ore. A recession in the West could slash China's growth to 7.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2012 from 10.4 per cent in 2010, according to Deutsche Bank.
Growth may even sink to 5 per cent after 2013, Nouriel Roubini, chairman of New York-based Roubini Global Economics, said in July.
"If China's growth falls by half, the price of non-food commodities will be seriously affected," says Michael Pettis, a finance professor at Beijing's Peking University.
Gillard rejects such predictions. "There's no advice to me that would cause me concern about Chinese demand collapsing."
That sort of bullishness was on ample display in early August when a record 2400 mining entrepreneurs and their financial backers flew to the Outback.
Their destination: the Wild West gold-rush-era town of Kalgoorlie. Their purpose: to party and promote their newest discoveries at an annual convention called the Diggers and Dealers Forum.
By day, the miners and their bankers convened in a large tent near Australia's biggest gold mine, a 3km-long, 1.5km-wide and 400m-deep hole known as the Super Pit.
By night, many of them continued their wheeling and dealing at honky-tonk watering holes.
Among those packed 10 deep at the bar amid the fading grandeur of the Palace Hotel one evening in August was David Flanagan, chief executive of Atlas Iron, who has increased his company's market value by more than 50-fold to A$2.9 billion during the past five years.
"There are so many amazing deposits out there that the opportunities are limitless," Flanagan says. Amid the Diggers and Dealers bonhomie, Todd Buchholz, a former managing director at Tiger Management hedge fund and a one-time adviser to US President George W. Bush, struck a note of caution.
"China's golden moment will eventually fade," Buchholz said. Fortescue's Forrest and Power were the undisputed stars of the convention. Having made his billions, Forrest passed the chief executive baton to Power in July and stepped up to the chairmanship.
Forrest will be a hard act to follow. Fortescue's profit for the financial year that ended on June 30 jumped 76 per cent to A$1.02 billion.
Lately, however, China's red-hot economy has been cooling - even before fears over Europe's debt crisis deepened and global markets began their plunge.
The slowdown began after Beijing raised interest rates and curbed lending in a bid to lower inflation, which in July hit a three-year high of 6.5 per cent, before easing to 6.2 per cent in August. Partly as a result, global commodities prices slipped 18 per cent from April 8 to October 11 after more than doubling in the previous two years.
The Australian economy is also not shining on miners such as Fortescue. Average wages in the mining industry have jumped 33 per cent in the past five years to A$2113 a week. The state of the Australian dollar doesn't help, either.
Mining firms are paid in US dollars by clients, yet they have to pay their workers in the local currency, which soared more than 40 per cent in three years to well above parity with its US counterpart. Other costs have spiralled even higher. The 3.5m- diameter tyres used on dump trucks that haul iron ore and coal have tripled in price to US$100,000 each.
In August, Rio Tinto blamed rising costs and currency gains for a profit that came in below analysts' estimates.
Now, the mining companies face the prospect of higher taxes. As other sectors of the economy wilt, Prime Minister Gillard is planning to introduce an additional 30 per cent tax on iron ore and coal miners' profits next year and charge them US$23 a tonne on their carbon emissions.
However, Power says his faith in Fortescue's prospects is undiminished. "All I have to do to allay any concerns is to take another trip back to China. It is such a tremendous country, with a great track record of development."
Power says he is not reassured simply by China's massive construction projects that consume the steel made from Australian iron ore, coal and manganese.
What strikes him more, Power says, is the Chinese Government's decision to move major steelworks to the coast from inland. Beijing-based Shougang Group has already shifted operations, and Baosteel Group and Wuhan Iron & Steel plan to follow.
"That shows the Chinese intend to become even more dependent on imported iron ore than on their own domestic mines," Power says.
Australia's biggest money manager is also upbeat on China.
"People say it's a bit risky to put all your eggs in the China basket, but China is going to continue to grow," says Stephen Halmarick at Sydney-based Colonial First State Global Asset Management.
Halmarick says there's no sign that global turmoil will slow mining investment in Australia. "There are some massive projects in train in Australia, and they will all go ahead."
Fortescue has already raised the money to build its own railway lines - one capable of carrying the heaviest loads ever transported by rail.
This year, trains 2.7km long will carry 55 million tonnes of ore across 300km to China-bound ships waiting at Port Hedland.
Now, Forrest and his board have entrusted Power with overseeing Fortescue's next great leap forward: the tripling of production by spending US$8.4 billion on new mines, more rail tracks and a new port.
How long Fortescue will remain a hot investment depends not only on Power's ability to triple production of iron ore but also on China's appetite for consuming it.
Aussie gold
Population: 22.7 million.
Unemployment: 5.3pc
Exports: No 1 exporter of iron ore, coal and alumina. Ranks second in gold, zinc and lead production; fourth in nickel and silver; and sixth in copper.
Danger signs
High borrowing costs: Central bank rate is highest in developed world at 4.75pc.
Soaring currency: Up 40 per cent against US dollar in past three years.
China cools: Growth in key market tipped to fall from 10.4pc in 2010 to as low as 5pc in 2013.
- Bloomberg
EasyJet, Volotea, and Vueling were also fined for similar 'abusive practices'.