The time is ripe for Rio Tinto to use its soaring share price...

The time is ripe for Rio Tinto to use its soaring share price and strong balance sheet to make a major acquisition in copper, according to boutique fund manager Tribeca Investment Partners.

Tribeca portfolio manager Ben Cleary said Rio should consider coming in over the top of BHP and Newcrest and buy SolGold and its copper assets in Ecuador. "This is one we have been watching and we think the asset is better off in Rio's hands," he said. Mr Cleary said a potential $1.5 billion tilt at SolGold looked like at obvious option for Rio."It is a massive block cave operation, 400,000 tonnes of copper production for the next 40 years, and we think Rio is the best underground block cave miner," he said...........

.........Mr Cleary said Rio's iron ore division had put it in a strong position and that position would become even stronger following Vale's production problems."Rio have the best iron ore assets in the world, they benefited from solid pricing last year and sensation pricing so far this year on the back of the Vale issues," he said."It would not surprise shareholders who have been listening to Rio Tinto to see a big acquisition. Both Rio and BHP are seemingly in love with copper and it is a commodity with a structural long term shortage."

And Tribeca has a fairly large interest in DGR.