Ivanhoe Mines Falls as Rio Tinto Stake Makes Takeover Unlikely

Ivanhoe Mines Ltd., the Vancouver- based miner with operations in Asia and Australia, fell the most in 16 months after giving Rio Tinto Group the right to boost its stake to 49 percent.

“Strike Ivanhoe off the list of potential takeover candidates in 2011,” Raymond Goldie, an analyst at Salman Partners Inc. in Toronto, wrote in a report.

Ivanhoe fell as much as 14 percent, the biggest intraday drop since July 2009, and was down 13 percent at C$25.73 as of 11:01 a.m. in Toronto for the largest decline in the Standard & Poor’s/TSX Composite Index.

Rio Tinto, the world’s third-biggest mining company, agreed to lend Ivanhoe $1.8 billion and take over the management of its Oyu Tolgoi project in Mongolia, the world’s biggest untapped copper and gold deposit. Rio will exercise its remaining share warrants and participate in Ivanhoe’s planned $1.2 billion rights offer.

To contact the reporter on this story: Elizabeth Stanton in New York at estanton@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Nick Baker at nbaker7@bloomberg.net