Good ExposureFrom The Toronto Star
Even if the deal for Tyler does not go through, a lot more people are going to be aware of ML.
Mercator targets Tyler in stock offer
Miner offers premium in unsolicited bid for junior
Oct 20, 2007 04:30 AM
VANCOUVER–Copper and molybdenum miner Mercator Minerals Ltd. is moving in on Calgary-based junior miner Tyler Resources Inc. with an unsolicited, all-stock offer worth about $121 million.
There was no immediate response yesterday from Tyler, which three weeks ago adopted a shareholder-rights plan to forestall any hostile takeover.
Mercator, based in Kingman, Ariz., said Tyler's Bahuerachi project in Mexico would be an "excellent complement" to Mercator's Mineral Park copper mine in Arizona.
Tyler shareholders are being offered 0.113 of a Mercator share for each Tyler share.
Mercator valued the bid at $1 per share based on its average TSX price of $8.84 in the past 20 trading days, a 35 per cent premium over Tyler's closing value Thursday.
Mercator shares closed at $9.71 yesterday, off nine cents on the TSX.
Tyler stock remained halted, having last traded at 71 cents on the TSX Venture Exchange, off three cents from Thursday, before the Mercator announcement.
"It is certainly, in our opinion, a win-win deal for everybody," Mercator CEO Mike Surratt said during a conference call.
"It gives Tyler shareholders a significant position in a much larger company that will have the wherewithal to bring the Bahuerachi property into production ... Together we would be a very formidable mid-tier company."
He said Mercator signed a confidentiality agreement with Tyler several weeks ago; however, since then "we've had conversations but we haven't exchanged any information."
Describing the proposed price as "a fair and equitable offer that leans to the high side of the market," he said that if Tyler's response "was too hostile we'd probably be sharpening the pencil a whole lot." He added: "In the long run we would certainly like to sit down with them and make this really work."
The proposal is "very timely," Surratt said, because Mercator expects it would take a year and a half to two years to advance Bahuerachi to a building stage, which would coincide with completion of expansion work by Mercator's established team at Mineral Park.
The Canadian Press
