Although the Anchor board has resisted the tender offer, analysts have said they expect the company to accept it, helping to push up the stock price.

The Anchor board said in its announcement last week that it planned to name him chairman when he joins Anchor in addition to chief executive.

The Crown and Anchor boards were doing a steady business in every bar and the men who crowded around them were the new population of the goldfields.

"The decision by the Anchor board to respond to our offer by adopting a poison pill suggests that the board will try to deprive the Anchor shareholders of the opportunity to accept our $20 offer," a company spokesman said.

But some analysts have questioned the wisdom of Anchor's poison pill, and one suggested that if the Anchor board allowed the Vitro offer to be withdrawn without doing something dramatic to enhance shareholder value it would be inviting lawsuits from shareholders.