ALUMINUM Corporation of China (Chalco) has suspended its shares pending an announcement on an ""important discussion"".
Chalco"s parent company, Chinalco, is in talks with Rio Tinto to buy a stake in the $US4.6 billion ($A5.09 billion) Oyu Tolgoi mine in Mongolia or the British company"s partner in the project, Ivanhoe Mines.
Chinalco has ""indicated an interest in acquiring a minority equity stake in the company or acquiring, from the company, a direct minority ownership interest in the Oyu Tolgoi project,"" Rio said this month in a US Securities and Exchange Commission filing.
Rio is working to repair relations with Chinalco, its largest shareholder. They soured last year when it scrapped a $US19.5 billion investment by the Chinese company and four Rio employees were arrested in Shanghai.
Ivanhoe deputy chairman Peter Meredith said in May that his company might bring in another partner to the copper and gold project and it made sense for Chinese interests to study an investment.
Ivanhoe spent more than six years negotiating an accord with Mongolia over the project, which Rio has described as the world"s largest untapped copper and gold resource. Ivanhoe said in January that it hired Citigroup to study options, including debt and equity offerings and asset sales.
Chalco shares are expected to resume trading in Hong Kong and Shanghai tomorrow.