The Anaconda Co., the world's biggest copper producer, refused two years ago to sell Chile any portion of its huge Chuquicamata and El Salvador mines, the source of 61% of the company's annual production and half of its earnings. Since then, the Latin American political winds have shifted. Last week Anaconda management decided that paid-for nationalization of the two mines, offered by moderate President Eduardo Frei, was better than the outright expropriation that Chilean leftists were demanding.
The company agreed to sell Chile 51% of its mines on next Jan. 1 for about $200 million. The remainder is to be...
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