Tom Albanese, CEO of Rio Tinto Group, poses for a photograph at the Rio Tinto offices in Melbourne (file). Rio Tinto sacked Albanese yesterday and revealed a $14bn writedown almost entirely on the value of his two most significant acquisitions, the Alcan aluminium group and Mozambican coal. An engineer who became the miner’s first American boss, Albanese will be replaced by Australian Sam Walsh who heads Rio’s operations in iron ore, where it is the world’s second largest producer. New Jersey-born, Alaska-trained Albanese had until now survived the consequences of his disastrous $38bn acquisition of Alcan in 2007, a bruising top-of-the-market deal when Rio was under pressure from rivals to bulk up or be bought. The deal, just two months after Albanese took the reins, turned bad as markets crumbled and aluminium prices slumped, battering Rio’s balance sheet, nearly forcing it into the arms of Chinese state-owned Chinalco and triggering a $15bn rights issue.
