Australia Whitehaven bids due Wednesday, some suitors drop out -sources

Wed Feb 2, 2011 6:00am GMT
SYDNEY Feb 2 (Reuters) - Australia's Whitehaven Coal expects to receive non-binding offers from Chinese, Indian and Korean parties but several potential suitors have dropped out of the process as bidders raise concern about price, sources said on Wednesday.
Indicative bids for Whitehaven which put itself up for auction in October, were due on Wednesday, the sources said. Whitehaven is valued at about $3.5 billion at current share prices.
However, China's Yanzhou Coal Mining Co and major shareholder Alpha Natural Resources were not expected to lodge bids, two sources familiar with the matter said.
Whitehaven declined to comment.
Whitehaven has declined to name the parties it has been talking to but U.S. miner Peabody Energy and China's state-run Shenhua Group were expected to bid. There was interest from a number of Indian, Chinese and Korean bidders, one source said. (Reporting by Michael Smith; Editing by Ed Davies,sourced:Thomson Reuters)