Industrials entrepreneur Sanjeev Gupta has continued his billion-pound spending spree with a deal to acquire a coking coal mine in Australia.

Mr Gupta’s GFG Alliance group’s Simec division has signed a binding agreement to buy the Tahmoor mine in New South Wales from Glencore.

No price was disclosed for the transaction, though market estimates have put the value of the deal at about $100m (£74m).

Tahmoor, which has 340 staff, is a major supplier of coking coal to the nearby Whyalla steelworks, which GFG bought last summer. The deal saved more than 5,000 jobs at the plant, which had been pushed into administration by falling commodity prices.