I gave you a 'thumbs up' and a 5 on the post. I liked the insights.

When we start dealing at the multinational level or with the Majors things are NEVER linear. While we see one side of the deal, the deal makers are doing deals inside of deals. For example Li and his dad are heavily connected into the National People's Congress (Chinese Government). The same gov't that gave Correa the red carpet treatment the week before in Beijing and said that they would be happy to invest a couple of billion in infastructure in Ecuador. Unstated was the question of 'in return for what'?

I suspect that China wants the base metal resources that are developing but if they can tie in a gold deposit along with it so be it. The bottom line is that the tighter the relationships the less 'free lancing' Correa can do. If you promise mining access in return for investment from China Ecuador doesn't get to play around with changing their rules again later. They don't do business that way.