Paul Skinner, the chairman of Rio Tinto, defended the mining group’s financial position less than 24 hours after BHP Billiton, its Anglo-Australian rival, abandoned its proposed hostile take­over.

“We are confident that our debt position is manageable, we have $9bn of debt which is due for repayment in October 2009 [and] we don’t see any need to issue equity to meet that,” Mr Skinner said Wednesday in Sydney.