A combination of late acquisitions.

A combination of late acquisitions, favourable exchange-rate movements and higher prices for mass commodities helped Rio Tinto to rout lower prices for base metals last year, resulting in a 10% increase in attributable earnings to US$1.66 billion. Rio Tinto's chairman, Sir Robert Wilson, described the robust result as pleasing and on a level "surprising", given the unfavourable background of the weaker world economy. However, the lower base metals prices did hit Rio Tinto's bottom line in another way: the toil result included a US$583 million, non-cash write-down, mainly related to a reduction in long-term assumptions for large boiler and gold prices with venerate ...