Pasta and mining

I must visit Santini more often.

Back in the days when I worked for The Daily Telegraph, it used to be one of my regular lunching spots as it is (literally) a stones throw away from the Telegraph offices in Victoria/Belgravia. It was also great place for people watching, as you would often see some of the City grandees, bankers and hedge managers dining at the restaurant.

I haven't been back to Santini since I left the Telegraph Media Group last year but it seems things don't change. Today, Telegraph journalists Ben Marlow and Andrew Critchlow point out in The Sunday Telegraph, that Glencore boss Ivan Glasenberg and Andrew Mckenzie, chief executive of BHP Billiton, were spotted having lunch at the salubrious Italian restaurant last week. Here is a link to Ben Marlow's piece: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/11156314/The-Government-delivered-on-Royal-Mail-after-all.html

Quite why these big beasts of the mining industry both decided to meet for lunch at Santini on the day Glencore was forced to confirm it approached Rio Tinto about a $160 billion merger in July is beyond me.

Still, now that they have been outed I am sure there will be plenty of speculation about what that lunch conversation involved...