Community leaders in the towns along the Elk River Valley in the Kootenays liked Teck Resources Ltd.’s idea of splitting itself in two and creating a stand-alone, locally headquartered company out of the region’s coal mines that are their lifeblood.

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They are warier of the prospective takeover of Teck, along with those community-sustaining mines, by Switzerland-based commodities-trading giant Glencore, now that Teck’s board of directors has hit pause on its first attempt at the separation.

Teck, Canada’s largest independent mining company, pulled the corporate split off the ballot of its April 26 annual general meeting with executives worried it wouldn’t clear the two-thirds majority it needed proceed, with CEO Jonathan Price saying its plan is “to pursue a simpler and more direct separation.”

Glencore’s $22.5 billion unsolicited bid to swallow Teck whole, which it unveiled April 3, remains in the wings as an alternative. The commodities-trading giant is promising to fold Teck’s mines into a bigger, more influential entity, which Glencore would in turn split into two, with one entity focused on base-metals production and the other holding their combined coal mines, including Glencore’s Australian thermal-coal mines.

https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/bc-communities-wary-of-takeover-proposal-for-teck-resources