Southern Copper mulls options for rapid growth

By Frank Jack Daniel and Tomas Sarmiento

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Spurred by soaring prices for metals hitting records almost every day, copper mining giant Southern Copper Corp. (PCU.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz)(SPC.LM: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) is looking at ways to grow quickly, including acquisitions or expanding its mines and opening new ones.

Chief Financial Officer Eduardo Gonzalez told Reuters on Wednesday that Southern Copper, or SCC, is actively looking at three options -- bringing its own huge reserves to market, buying up working mines or opening a partnership with another large miner.

The quickest route to producing more copper would be via acquisitions or a partnership with one of the company's competitors.

"(One option) is to buy a mine in production, where you don't add more copper to the market and you benefit from the current price curve," Gonzalez told the Reuters Latin America Investment Summit in Mexico City.

Exploiting SCC's own reserves would take years and prices might not hold that long at current levels, Gonzalez said.

"We have to be clear about the value generated for our shareholders by an expansion, let's say, of 100,000 tonnes within five years when copper prices might no longer be at $2.50 (a pound) and could be considerably lower."

He did not, however, rule out simply ramping up production and said SCC could double current output of around 700,000 tonnes in 5 to 7 years if it started building now at its Cananea mine or Los Arcos property in Mexico, and at its Toquepala mine or Los Chancas site in Peru.

"I don't need anyone else to grow."  Continued...