88���ֳ�

Thiess secured six major mining contracts worth more than $7.7 billion during the 12 months to June 2011, including a $1.3 billion extension at the Burton coal mine for Peabody Energy, a $182 million variation at the Collinsville coal mine for Xstrata and a $145 million joint venture at Lake Vermont in Queensland.

Thiess sold its 5% stake in Burton coal to Peabody Energy for $35 million in June 2011 which realised a pre-tax gain of $27 million.

In New South Wales the company was awarded a $1 billion contract at the Mt Owen coal mine for Xstrata and a $220 million extension at the Wilpinjong coal mine for Peabody Energy.

In India, the Thiess-Minecs joint venture (90% Thiess) secured a landmark $4.9 billion contract over 22 years at the Pakri Barwadih coal mine for NTPC. Revenue over the first five years is estimated at $354 million.

Mining services is a relatively new market for Leighton subsidiary John Holland, and the company secured two significant contracts during the year including a $156 million three-year contract at Anglo Coal’s Lake Lindsay and Oak Park operations near Middlemount, Queensland, and a $349 million open cut mining contract at the Jellinbah coal mine in Queensland.

In Queensland, Leighton Contractors started work on stage 2 of the Poitrel coal mine for BHP Mitsui Coal, worth $225 million over 3 years, and phase 1 of the Dawson coal mine for Anglo Coal, worth $155 million over two years.

Growth in Mongolia was sustained by strong global demand for bulk commodities and energy.

The company continued to grow its mining and infrastructure work and production volumes from the major coal mines operated by Leighton Asia –UHG and Khushuut – increased in line with current plans.

Leighton said the outlook for Australian metallurgical coal exports was well supported by the expected increase in China’s reliance on imports relative to domestic coal, due to the increasing cost of domestic coal production and decreasing quality.

Thermal coal production in Australia is also forecast to rise sharply by 18% to 175 million tonnes in 2011, boosted by the completion of new coal mines and expanded capacity in NSW.

As of May 2011, 64 million tonnes per annum of additional capacity had been identified in projects under construction or committed, with an estimated capital cost of $9.2 billion.

Port capacity is expected to rise to 430Mtpa in 2011 after expansions were implemented at port facilities at Gladstone, Abbot Point and Newcastle.

Beyond 2011 port capacity is forecast to be further expanded to more than 660Mtpa by 2020, with rail capacity meeting or exceeding this level.

While Leighton Holdings reported an after tax loss of $409 million for the 2010-11 financial year, it did manage to improve on its April guidance of an expected $427 million loss.

However, there were no surprises for shareholders with the group reiterating that no final dividend would be paid after chief executive David Stewart confirmed it was an “extremely disappointing” result brought about by a number of challenges.

“Pleasingly though, the Leighton group maintains a strong level of work in hand, has a strong balance sheet and anticipates reporting an after tax profit of between $600 to 650 million for the 12 months to June 30, 2012,” he said.

“This guidance does not include the potential impacts of the sale of the HWE Mining iron ore business for $705 million.”

Stewart said the underlying results across the core contracting business were solid during the year with good performances from markets such as Asia, telecommunications, and oil and gas related construction.

“During the half year we implemented a strategic review of our investments and key initiatives taken as a result have been the sale of Thiess’ 5 per cent stake in the Burton coal mine for $35 million, resulting in a post-tax profit of around $20 million, and the decision to increase the stake in Devine to 50.06 per cent, resulting in an after-tax gain of $71 million,” Stewart said.

“We also moved to strengthen our balance sheet in April, raising $758 million in equity via an accelerated renounceable entitlement offer.

“Leighton now has a strong capital base with shareholders’ equity of $2.3 billion, total assets of $9.8 billion and debt and finance facilities of around $1.8 billion, with cash in the bank of $1.4 billion.”