A recent news article reported that that Australia's share of global capital raised by the mining industry fell from 21% in 2008 to 15% in 2011. This, where the Australian mining industry is said to have raised U.S.4.3 billion in 2008 and U.S.4.5 billion in 2011.

Based on data included in the article, global capital raised by the mining industry in 2008 and 2011 approximated U.S.$20.5 billion and U.S.$30 billion respectively. The report suggests this casts doubt on Australia's taxation policies related to mining ventures.

It seems to me that in order to reach a meaningful conclusion as to whether Australia's taxation policies had much to do with this it would be necessary to analyze what percentage of the capital raised by Australian mining companies in each of 2008 and 2011 was invested in projects located in Australia, and what percentage was invested by those companies in 'non-Australian based' projects.

The interesting thing that comes out of this report is that total world mining company capital raises increased by about 50% between 2008 and 2011. I will be surprised if this trend does not continue.

Read: New data on drop in AUS global share of mining capital raisings. Source: The International Resource Journal, March 11, 2012. Reading time 3 minutes.