Australia is to tighten scrutiny of foreign investors, in the first example of a country taking concrete steps to control the activities of sovereign wealth funds and state-owned companies. The government published six principles it said were intended to “enhance transparency of Australia’s foreign investment screening regime”. The move comes as Australia is examining the $14bn joint purchase by Chinese-state owned Chinalco, and Alcoa of the US of 9% of Rio Tinto, the Anglo-Australian mining group that has rejected a hostile $147bn offer from rival BHP Billiton.

This entry was posted by Gwen Robinson on Tuesday, February 19th, 2008 at 5:49 and is filed under Capital markets, M&A. Edit this entry.