Chinese lender shows interest in Australasian

Australasian Resources says a Chinese bank has expressed interest in procuring funding for its proposed multi-billion dollar Balmoral South iron ore project in the Pilbara.

Australasian announced today it had received a letter of interest from the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China that expressed a willingness to finance the project, on the back of last month’s announcement that Metallurgical Corp of China had signed on to help raise the funds needed to progres the development.

MCC was also announced last month as engineering, procurement and construction management contractor for Balmoral.

Based on recent feasibility study updates, the Balmoral project will cost around $3.9 billion to bring into production at 12 million tonnes per annum, including construction and commissioning of a processing plant.

MCC will assist Australasian subsidiary International Minerals in preparing and submitting loan applications to a number of Chinese banks.

“ICBC have stated that they look forward to receiving this application and report in due course to assist in the financing of up to 70 per cent of the project by way of an export buyer’s credit,” Australasian chairman Domenic Martino said in a statement.

Mr Martino said a proposal was also in place to approach additional Chinese banks with an application for export buyer’s credit.

By close of trade today, Australasian stocks had gained 8.3 per cent, trading at 13 cents. The company's major shareholder is magnate Clive Palmer.