When a company is bought all of the assets and liabilities go with it so the new owner would inherit this contract with Cliffs. I don't see that as a big deal, Cliffs will be very happy with a buyout also, they are in business to make money. And their interests are fairly standard in the industry so they could keep them or negotiate something new and sell everything to a buyer, anything is possible with the right amount of cash.

It still seems to me that Cliffs is fighting its own battles which have to do with the price of iron ore and the desires of a greenmailer (activist investor) who thinks they can make more money by selling off Cliffs assets than the company can by keeping them. Time will tell how this plays out. Cliffs is doing what most companies do in these situations, use the activist ideas themselves and start selling assets. They are playing for time and likely hoping either the price of iron ore goes up or Casablanca gets tired, neither seems likely. But regardless of who owns Cliffs or directs it they will want to make money from the assets and that will likely mean disposing of ZEN at some point but my guess is they will wait for higher prices, since current management have now stoped sellin in the market and doings block trades because they don't feel they are getting what ZEN is worth.

Cliffs, whoever owns it, has a lot tied up in ZEN and unless Cliffs undergoes a complete fire sale will carefully dispose of assets or keep them to maximize value.

Bottom line none of Cliffs actions have much to do with ZEN except that the timing kinda sucks and ZEN is just collateral.