BHP Group Ltd (ASX: BHP) shares are currently up by 0.1%, having been up more than 0.7% in earlier trading, following news related to the Samarco class action.
The Samarco dam failure in Brazil destroyed villages and killed 19 people. The Samarco joint venture involved BHP Brasil and Vale. For years, the ASX mining share has been working on remediation and repair. It recently announced an agreement to settle the legal action.
More than A$10 billion has already been spent on remediation and compensation, and BHP has agreed to spend billions more. The agreement's total financial value, on a 100% basis, is A$47.9 billion.
According to the Australian Financial Review, that agreement seems to have led to some Brazilian parties being willing to leave the class action in the British courts.
Class action developments
The AFR has reported that four Brazilian municipalities – Sobralia, Corrego Novo, Sao Mateus, and Conceicao da Barra – have withdrawn from the litigation action.
The newspaper reported that BHP's Brazil country president, Emir Calluf, believes more Brazilian municipalities will accept the settlement that BHP, Vale and the government had agreed:
We are seeing good progress in the implementation of the comprehensive settlement agreement with compensation arrangements under way and beginning to be accessed, and we anticipate this will increase in the coming weeks and months.
The settlement agreement in Brazil is the fastest and most efficient avenue to provide compensation and closure for those impacted by the Mariana dam collapse.
The AFR's report noted that while a large compensation figure has been agreed upon, a significant portion of the US$31.7 billion compensation can and will be funded by the cash flow produced by Samarco mines, which are operating and producing commodities. BHP believes the rest of its share will be covered by the US$6.55 billion provision it has already informed the market of.
Legal action is still going ahead
While four Brazilian municipalities have left the legal action, there are still another 42 reported to be involved in the class action. Those remaining municipalities will supposedly need to choose between the agreed compensation or the class action route.
Law business Pogust Goodhead is involved in the British legal action against the miners and wants to fight for "full compensation". The AFR reported that Tom Goodhead said:
Each municipality and its respective mayor will make a decision based on what they believe to be in the municipality's best interests.
The vast majority of municipalities … have communicated to Pogust Goodhead that they wish to continue litigation in England in order to seek the full damages that they have suffered as a result of BHP's complicity in the collapse of the Fundao Dam.
The trial in London remains the only viable route, for the majority of those affected, to receive full compensation.
For those clients who may be eligible for the new scheme in Brazil, a large number of them have expressed extreme scepticism to me about another supposed solution to be implemented by Samarco.
Time will tell how successful the class action is.
BHP share price snapshot
Since the start of 2024, the BHP share price has fallen by 20%.
