Atalaya Mining Regulatory News (ATYM)

13 Oct 2008 08:40



The announcement text is unchanged and is reproduced in full below.

AIM: EMED 13 October 2008

Changes in Significant Shareholdings and Proposed New Directors

EMED Mining Public Limited ("EMED Mining" or "the Company") is pleased to report the completion of shareholder transactions foreshadowed in the Company's announcement of 1 October 2008 regarding the restructure of the Rio Tinto Mine acquisition arrangements. 

As previously announced, the Company issued 39,140,000 new shares to the MRI Group in relation to the restructure of the ownership and acquisition arrangements for the Rio Tinto Mine. This represented a holding of approximately 16.3% in EMED Mining's expanded issued share capital base of 239,692,911. Also as previously announced, it was intended that the Company would facilitate the MRI Group's transfer of 7,600,000 of their shares to other shareholders.

In relation to this intended share transfer, the Company is pleased to now confirm that MRI Group has entered into purchase and sale arrangements with OZ Minerals and Resource Capital Funds ("RCF"), both existing significant shareholders in the Company, pursuant to which MRI Group will sell 3,800,000 of its shares in the Company to each of OZ Minerals and RCF. The share purchase and sale transactions will be settled at 18p per ordinary share as crossings in the stock market by brokers FDC after admission of the shares to CREST.

The changes in the significant shareholdings of MRI Group, OZ Minerals and RCF as a result of this foreshadowed transaction are as follows:

The Company has a strong group of supportive shareholders. OZ Minerals, a leading Australian base metal and gold producer, is a founding shareholder along with Management (20% fully-diluted); Altima, a UK-based investment fund, recently increased its shareholding to 5%; RMB, a leading South African mining bank, holds 4% fully-diluted as does Fidelity International.

The Directors have invited Messrs Ross Bhappu, of RCF, and Ashwath Mehra, of MRI Group, to join the Board of Directors as Non-Executive Directors. Once Messrs Bhappu and Mehra become Directors, the Board of Directors will be comprised as follows:

Non-Executive Chairman: Ronnie Beevor - Director OZ Minerals and other miners. Former Head of investment banking Rothschild Australia 

Managing Director: Harry Anagnostaras-Adams - CEO in mining investments and mining. Former Deputy Chair Australian Gold Council

Finance Director: John Leach, Chartered Accountant specialising in mining

Non-Executive Directors: 

Ross Bhappu - Metallurgical Engineer. Partner of RCF - a major private equity group for mining

Ashwath Mehra - Commodities Trader, CEO of MRI Group - a major copper marketer and trader

Mike Price - Mining Engineer formerly senior mining banker with SocGen, Barclays and Rothschild

Gordon Toll - Mining Engineer. An investor formerly a senior executive with BHP & RTZ

EMED Mining's Managing Director Mr Harry Anagnostaras-Adams said "EMED Mining continues its preparations for the expected start of copper production in Spain and our building of a European-based mining house. The turmoil in world financial markets serves to highlight the importance of the Company's strong shareholder base which is dominated by mining industry specialists. We also look forward to welcoming Ross Bhappu of leading mining investment group RCF to our Board along with Ashwath Mehra of leading international metals trader MRI Group."

Enquiries

Notes to Editors: About EMED Mining Public Limited

EMED Mining was admitted to trading on AIM in May 2005 following a placing of its shares, and its share market capitalisation has since grown from approximately £4 million to approximately £28 million. The Company is based in Cyprus and has a strong commitment to responsible development of metal production operations in Europe, with an initial focus on copper and gold. 

The Group's region of interest are the tectonic belts spanning across Europe and over to the Middle East. The strategy is to evaluate exploration and development opportunities in several jurisdictions throughout this quality mineral belt and to promote sustainable development practices through implementation of European Union and other leading-edge international standards. The Company strictly implements its Environmental & Community Policy which includes:

EMED Mining has now established a strong position in the following selected zones:

Exploration areas in Slovakia are centred on a cluster of volcanic centres. Low-detection geochemical methods are being applied to these areas for the first time together with open-pit bulk mining concepts. The principal targeted mineralisation style is low-grade, bulk-mineable porphyry gold. The Company has announced gold discoveries at Biely Vrch, Kralova and Slatinske Lazy in Slovakia. 

The mines in Cyprus and at Rio Tinto in Spain, located in the Iberian Pyrite Belt, which is probably among the best known in the world for its mineral endowment. EMED Mining's goal is to restart copper production at its projects in both of these well-endowed, historical mining districts. Both Spain and Cyprus are progressive members of the European Union and EMED Mining has been made to feel welcome in both host countries. The styles of mineral deposits and production techniques are similar in both mining districts. 

Exploration areas in Turkey were vended into 32%-owned KEFI Minerals Plc which was admitted to AIM in December 2006. KEFI Minerals owns carefully selected licence areas in Turkey, as well as an extensive proprietary database of regional and specific exploration data providing a pipeline of further projects to evaluate. See www.kefi-minerals.com. 

For further information on the Company's activities, visit www.emed-mining.com or www.emed.tv