American company acquires Canadian Metals Economic Group

Virginia-based SNL Financial announced Wednesday the acquisition of Halifax, Nova Scotia-based Metals Economics Group (MEG), provider of global mining industry information and analysis.

MEG enjoys a reputation for high-quality asset-level information and a robust data history extending back more than 30 years. This acquisition marks SNL’s entry into a fifth distinct vertical market, and represents the company’s first such expansion since the launch of its Media & Communications coverage in 2007.

“We’re thrilled to enter the metals and mining market via the acquisition of MEG, a company that shares our core values around data quality and deep subject matter expertise,” said Mike Chinn, SNL President and CEO. “While this is SNL’s largest acquisition to date, we see MEG as simply the starting point for our investment in the metals and mining sector. We intend to expand MEG’s already excellent project coverage by adding content consistent with SNL’s ‘single source’ information platform philosophy for our clients.”

The company’s new division, SNL Metals Economics Group, currently covers thousands of global mining projects from early exploration through production, providing detailed, critical company and asset-level data. Project and company information as well as existing in-depth research studies and services will in time become integrated and available through SNL’s online product platform.  MEG’s annual Corporate Exploration Strategies, the definitive source for information on worldwide mining company exploration budgets by company, commodity and geography, ultimately will be integrated into the platform, too.  SNL Metals Economics Group will complete detailed coverage of all major minerals projects by adding manganese and bauxite in the coming year.

“Our information has always been accepted as the highest quality supply pipeline data available in the industry, and we are excited by the rich opportunities presented by SNL to quickly improve our functionality and the depth and breadth of our coverage,” said Michael Chender, founder and CEO of Metals Economics Group. “We are delighted that our clients will also benefit from SNL’s dedication to the highest standards of quality, accuracy, and customer support.”

Stewart McKelvey and Dennis Rooker, PC served as legal advisors to SNL.  Atwood Capital Partners served as financial adviser to Metals Economics Group, with McInnes Cooper as legal adviser. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

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