China may have once have had a reputation for caution in its foreign corporate forays but it’s no longer scared of marching into difficult economic or political territory.
Any doubts on this score are dispelled by the news that the Beijing government has authorised Sinochem, the state chemicals group, to work on plans for intervening in BHP Billiton’s $39bn effort to take over Canada’s PotashCorp.
China has not declared its intentions on a possible counterbid. But its ambitions are obvious - as the world’s biggest potash importer it wants a say in the fate of the world’s largest producer. And Beijing will not be put off by its past reverses on the bruising battlefield of international mergers and acquisitions.