The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has formally ended its civil lawsuit against Guy Elliott, the former chief financial officer of Rio Tinto, closing a legal chapter that stemmed from the mining group’s troubled Mozambique coal investment, Reuters reported.

In a filing to a Manhattan federal court on Friday, the SEC stated it was dismissing the case “in the exercise of its discretion,” without commenting on the merits of the remaining allegations against Elliott.

The case originated in October 2017, when the SEC accused Rio Tinto of providing misleading information to investors regarding the value of Rio Tinto Coal Mozambique, acquired through a 3.7 billion US dollar takeover of Riversdale Mining in 2011. The regulator alleged that the company subsequently raised over 5.5 billion US dollars from U.S. fixed-income investors while continuing to overstate the asset’s value, despite internal assessments indicating a negative valuation of 680 million US dollars following Mozambique’s rejection of a barging plan for coal transport.

The financial fallout for Rio Tinto was significant. In 2013, the company recorded a writedown exceeding 3 billion US dollars on the Mozambique project, and sold the assets the following year for just 50 million US dollars.

Earlier settlements had already been reached with senior Rio Tinto executives. In 2023, the company agreed to pay a 28 million US dollar civil penalty, while former chief executive Tom Albanese accepted a 50,000 US dollar fine. Elliott, who has consistently denied wrongdoing, described the SEC’s dismissal as “a complete defense victory,” according to a statement from his lawyers.

The SEC did not respond immediately to requests for comment. The litigation against Elliott had persisted until February last year, when U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres ruled that questions over whether he misled auditors and violated books and records rules should be resolved by a jury.

The resolution of this case coincides with a major development in the mining sector. Rio Tinto and Glencore announced on Thursday that they were engaged in merger discussions that could potentially create the world’s largest mining company.