of current profits, a sin often committed by our competition. The mines Utah developed have been low-cost producers and this gave us a real advantage in the marketplace. We concentrated our attention on improving the quality of our earnings and this we did in three ways. First, we put our major efforts on the minerals that were more stable in price like iron ore and coal and put less emphasis on those minerals like copper, lead and zinc that are volatile in price. Second, we positioned ourselves to take advantage of markets that were growing rapidly - Australia; alternate energy forms to petroleum; international trade in raw materials for the steel industry. Finally, we made a virtue out of a necessity and built up a mineral sales backlog of $6 billion in long term contracts with escalation protection, giving us an assurance of margins and volume that the investor found very appealing. These quality factors found their way into our price/earnings ratio. If you wonder why a company that was faring so well on its own welcomed a merger with General Electric, the reasons are not too hard to find. We were in part a victim of our own success and certainly the primary motivation was concern over the concentration of our earnings in a single commodity (coking coal) in a single country (Australia), no matter how sound the commodity or how stable the country. The actions of the Labor Government when it came to power in Australia in 1972 made us uneasy to say the least. Peru was even more worrisome. Our shareholders and our employees needed the protection that comes 11