Archive | Glencore

Glencore auditing 140 slimes dams – by Martin Creamer (MiningWeekly.com – February 20, 2019)

February 21, 2019 in Africa Mining, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles, Mining Environmental Accidents, Pollution, Tailing Dams and Abandoned Mines

http://www.miningweekly.com/

JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Diversified mining and marketing company Glencore is auditing 140 slimes dams, 65 of them active and 75 of them closed.

The company has been undertaking detailed assessments and audits of all material tailings storage facilities (TSFs) over the past three years, after accumulating a TSF significant asset footprint through mergers and acquisitions and organic growth.

Glencore CEO Ivan Glasenberg made these revelations at a media briefing on Wednesday against the background of last month’s tragic loss of 170 people at Vale’s Córrego do Feijão iron-ore mine in Brazil, which has prompted renewed industry action to ensure that TSFs are not vulnerable to collapse. Continue Reading →

Blast may have triggered quake in Sudbury: Vale – by Donald Macdonald (Sudbury Star – February 8, 2019)

February 8, 2019 in Canadian Regional Media and Web Publications, Glencore, Nickel, Ontario Mining, Sudbury Basin, Vale

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

No serious damage to Garson Mine or nearby Nickel Rim Mine, companies say.

Work is proceeding at Garson Mine after an earthquake Wednesday that originated at the Vale site but was felt by people residing more than 10 kilometres away.

Vale spokesperson Angie Robson said the company experienced a 2.9 magnitude seismic event at the 5,200 level of the mine shortly after 5 p.m. Fortunately, “no employees were injured as a result of this event,” she noted, and “work is continuing as normal, except in restricted areas of the mine.”

Robson said there was no damage to mobile equipment, “although there is some displaced rock that needs to be addressed, as well as some repair work to infrastructure in the affected area of the mine.” Continue Reading →

Ford launches blockchain project to trace cobalt in the Congo – by Hasan Chowdhury (The Telegraph – January 16, 2019)

January 17, 2019 in Africa Mining, Cobalt, Critical, Strategic and Rare Earth Minerals and Metals, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles, Metals and Manufacturing

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/

Ford is preparing to clamp down on labour exploitation in the cobalt mines of the Democratic Republic of Congo by using blockchain technology to keep a record of supplies in the metal, a key ingredient for electric vehicle batteries.

The US carmaker will partner with LG Chem, a South Korean chemicals specialist and Chinese mining firm Huayou Cobalt for a pilot programme that will aim to ensure the in-demand metal is responsibly sourced. Concerns have mounted around a practice known as artisanal mining, which often involves children mining for metals by hand.

According to the Congo’s Chamber of Mines, 2m people are involved in artisanal mining in the country, with around 200,000 miners specifically digging in copper mines. Cobalt is usually obtained as a byproduct of copper and nickel mining. Continue Reading →

Mining’s Biggest Jobs Are Up for Grabs. Here Are the Contenders – by Thomas Biesheuvel, Jack Farchy and David Stringer (Bloomberg News – January 16, 2019)

January 16, 2019 in Anglo American, BHP Billiton, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles

https://www.bloomberg.com/

Who will lead BHP, Anglo American and Glencore into the next decade?

Some of the mining world’s top executives are starting to plan their departures, driving speculation about who will lead their companies into the next decade.

The changing of the guard raises the prospect of a strategic shift, as the industry searches for ways to enthuse investors after a belt-tightening era characterized by asset sales and cost control. Here, based on conversations with executives, investors and industry decision makers, are some of the key names to watch.

BHP Group

There has been near-constant speculation for years around the future of BHP Group CEO Andrew Mackenzie. By 2017, the chatter was so loud that the new chairman’s first meeting with the press was preceded by a statement backing his CEO. Continue Reading →

Katanga Mining, CEO and former insiders to pay $34.4-million in OSC settlement over misleading disclosures – by Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – December 19, 2018)

December 19, 2018 in Africa Mining, Canada Mining, Canadian Media Resource Articles, Glencore

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

Katanga Mining Ltd., its chief executive and six former insiders admitted they broke Canadian securities laws and have agreed to pay $34.4-million in penalties in a settlement with regulators that centred on “materially misleading” financial disclosures.

The Ontario Securities Commission fined Katanga CEO Johnny Blizzard $400,000 on Tuesday and banned him from serving as an officer or director with a Canadian-listed company for two years. Mr. Blizzard, who has been CEO since February, 2015, has agreed to step down from the company within 30 days.

The OSC levied the largest individual fine on Aristotelis Mistakidis, who will pay $2.45-million and is subject to an officer and director ban for four years. Mr. Mistakidis was a director with Katanga until late last year and is the outgoing head of Glencore PLC’s copper unit. Continue Reading →

Katanga Mining’s financial penalties in OSC settlement to top $20 million: sources – by Barbara Shecter (Financial Post – December 18, 2018)

December 18, 2018 in Africa Mining, Canada Mining, Canadian Media Resource Articles, Glencore

https://business.financialpost.com/

Katanga Mining Ltd., a subsidiary of Anglo-Swiss commodities and mining conglomerate Glencore PLC, is expected to settle serious allegations — including making misleading statements and failing to disclose risks associated with its operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo — at a hearing Dec. 18 in front of Canada’s largest capital markets regulator.

The combined financial penalties in the proposed settlement are understood to exceed $20 million, and a number of individuals are also expected to settle, including a key long-serving executive of the parent company who sat on Katanga’s board, sources say.

The Ontario Securities Commission had been investigating Katanga for months, including whether the firm, whose shares are traded on the Toronto Stock Exchange, adequately disclosed risks pertaining to international bribery, government payment and anti-corruption laws. Commission staff disclosed their allegations resulting from the probe in a 33-page document made public on Monday. Continue Reading →

Canadian regulator to fine Glencore-controlled miner over Congo – WSJ (Reuters U.S. – December 16, 2018)

December 17, 2018 in Africa Mining, Canada Mining, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles

https://www.reuters.com/

(Reuters) – A Glencore-controlled (GLEN.L) mining company and some of its current and former executives have agreed to pay more than $22 million to settle Canadian allegations they hid the risks of doing business with an Israeli close to Congolese President Joseph Kabila, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The expected settlement between the Ontario Securities Commission and Toronto-listed Katanga Mining Ltd is related to the company’s business activities in the Democratic Republic of Congo between 2014 and 2016, the Journal reported, citing an anonymous source.

A Glencore spokesman declined to comment. The Ontario Securities Commission did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Glencore’s share price rose around 1 percent by 0927 GMT, while the broader mining index was 1.4 percent higher. Continue Reading →

Glencore Makes a $36 Billion Bet on Dirty Coal – by Chris Bryant (Bloomberg News – December 4, 2018)

December 5, 2018 in Coal, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles

https://www.bloomberg.com/

CEO thinks shareholders are missing the picture on Glencore’s strong cash flow. If you’re happy with investing in coal, he may have a point.

Higher U.S. bond yields have made the payouts offered by most stocks look pretty underwhelming lately. Not so Glencore Plc, whose implied yield is startlingly high even though it’s throwing off cash like it’s going out of fashion.

The miner-cum-trader thinks it can generate $7.5 billion of free cash flow next year at current commodity prices. Absent a downturn in the economy, it’s conceivable that the company will return all of that to shareholders via dividends and buybacks, it said on Monday. Here’s the relevant slide:

The market shrugged at its largess, even erasing some of the gains Glencore had enjoyed from the easing of U.S.-China trade tensions. The shares have dropped more than 21 per cent this year and trade on less than 8 times estimated earnings. Continue Reading →

NEWS RELEASE: VALE AND GLENCORE TO INITIATE JOINT FEASIBILITY STUDY TO POTENTIALLY DEVELOP RESOURCES ACCESSIBLE FROM NICKEL RIM SOUTH MINE

December 4, 2018 in Copper, Glencore, Nickel, Sudbury Basin, Vale

SUDBURY, December 4, 2018 – Today, Vale and Glencore announced that they are entering into an agreement to facilitate a joint Feasibility Study to explore the possibility of developing and mining resources at depth accessible from the existing workings of Glencore’s Nickel Rim South Mine.

The Study will examine the economic and technical feasibility of using the existing shaft and infrastructure at Glencore’s Nickel Rim South Mine, as well as additional underground infrastructure, to potentially jointly develop and mine deposits in very close proximity to each other. This includes Vale’s Victor property and a shared deposit which exists adjacent to the boundary between each Company’s properties.

“A joint approach could allow for resources to be unlocked that would likely not otherwise be productive,” said Ricus Grimbeek, Chief Operating Officer, Vale’s North Atlantic Operations and Asian Refineries. “Assuming a successful outcome to our Study, this synergy could also lead to significant value generation – including job creation – at a time when the medium to long-term market outlook for both nickel and copper looks very promising,” he added. Continue Reading →

Glencore’s billionaire copper chief retires under legal pressure – by Jack Farchy and Mark Burton (Bloomberg News – December 3, 2018)

December 3, 2018 in Copper, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles

https://www.bloomberg.com/

LONDON – Glencore on Monday announced the retirement of-billionaire Aristotelis Mistakidis, its embattled head of copper trading and one of the company’s biggest shareholders.

Mistakidis’s departure marks the end of an era. The 56-year-old executive is one of the world’s most powerful commodities traders and built Glencore’s reputation as a dominant force in copper. But he’s come under intense pressure recently following a string of investigations, problems and legal headaches.

The US Department of Justice is probing Glencore’s dealings in the Democratic Republic of Congo, one of the poorest and most corrupt countries in the world. Canadian regulators are also investigating accounting irregularities at copper mines where Mistakidis was a director. Continue Reading →

In a hole: Glencore’s attempt at reinventing mining has run into trouble (The Economist – November 2018)

November 30, 2018 in Africa Mining, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles

https://www.economist.com/

Mining’s most risk-hungry company is under pressure to change its culture

FROM THE edge of the Kamoto Copper Company’s pit, it is hard even to see the mechanical diggers toiling dozens of tiers below. The 280-metre hole on the southern edge of the Democratic Republic of Congo is deeper than Africa’s tallest building is tall. Lorries take the best part of an hour to crawl out from its heart.

The greenish ore they lug is given its hue by copper but much of its value by cobalt nestled within. Usually driven to South Africa, then often shipped to China, the cobalt will emerge from a series of factories as the priciest component of a battery powering a smartphone or, increasingly, an electric car.

A sign at the mine indicates it is 1,320km to Kinshasa, the capital, half a week’s drive away. Another arrow points to a less likely destination: Baar, a sleepy suburb of Zurich, 6,600km away at the foot of the Swiss Alps. Located in a business park there are the headquarters of Glencore, the company that ultimately controls the Congolese mine. Continue Reading →

Trouble in the Congo: The Misadventures of Glencore – by Franz Wild, Vernon Silver and William Clowes (Bloomberg News – November 16, 2018)

November 20, 2018 in Africa Mining, Battery Technology Innovation/Electric Vehicles, Cobalt, Critical, Strategic and Rare Earth Minerals and Metals, Glencore, International Media Resource Articles

https://www.bloomberg.com/

What a time to own the world’s most valuable cobalt mine, and to have to fight to keep it.

A dozen years ago the future of technology bounced out of a remote corner of Africa on the back of a truck, along with a world of potential trouble. Both, embodied in the same load of rock, landed in the hands of Ivan Glasenberg, chief executive officer of Glencore Plc, the world’s largest middleman for the raw materials that fuel, feed, and underpin civilization.

Glasenberg’s obsession was copper, because China’s appetite for it was insatiable, with copper wire electrifying the nation’s rising cities and running through the appliances its factories sold to the West. The metal’s price had quadrupled in less than three years, triggering a global frenzy. Miners blasted it from Chilean mountaintops and dug it from the African earth as fast as they could.

At a processing plant in Zambia, Glencore was buying up all the ore containing copper it could get its hands on when technicians noticed something extraordinary. One trader consistently rolled in with rocks showing levels of purity that were off the charts—not just for copper, but also for the blue metal cobalt. Continue Reading →

Generations Of Miners Face The Future Of Automation Deep Underground – by Mary Katherine Keown (HuffPost Canada/Thet Canada.com – November 13, 2018)

November 14, 2018 in Canadian Media Resource Articles, Glencore, Nickel, Ontario Mining, Sudbury Basin, Vale

https://www.thetcanada.com/

A proud third-generation miner, Mickey O’Brien enjoys the every day grind of taking that deep dive to the centre of the earth. A miner at Vale’s Copper Cliff Mine in Sudbury, Ontario, O’Brien works 10-hour shifts. After suiting up and assembling, he and his coworkers break into a number of crews to start the new and soiled process of gnawing away on the earth greater than 1.5 km underground.

“I am on haulage,” O’Brien says. “Proper now I am driving a grader, however I am being skilled on a picker, so if we’ve massive chunks after a blast, the news will put them apart and I drill holes in them and I blow them up, and the news will come and decide them up. Cool, eh?”

A proud labour rights activist, he considers a lot of his colleagues — most of whom are members of Steelworkers Native 6500 — to be brothers and sisters. “I have been engaged on Inco property since I used to be 18 and I am 38 now,” he says, referencing the title of his firm earlier than it was purchased out by Vale in 2006. Continue Reading →

BHP’s ‘measured creep’ of risk appetite – by Matthew Stevens (Australian Financial Review – November 11, 2018)

November 12, 2018 in BHP Billiton, Copper, Glencore, Gold and Silver, International Media Resource Articles, Junior Exploration Sector, Latin America Mining, Oil and Gas Sector-Politics and Image

https://www.afr.com/

Ivan Glasenberg wondered recently how it was the BHP had moved into mining frontier of Ecuador when management at Australia’s Smart Thinking resources house was supposedly content to sustain and grow its business around its existing sites. This bemusement is well founded.

Among the themes consistent through Andrew Mackenzie’s evolving reformation of BHP are that it has little or no appetite for investment in frontier opportunities and that the company’s growth aspirations will be best afforded through a laser focus on the Global Australian’s existing six-strong fleet of mega-resource basins.

But that message is in the process of being massaged into something more nuanced, and not just because BHP’s two-stream play to possibly shape Ecuador’s future in copper stands an obvious test of the past house line in emerging mining sovereignties. Continue Reading →

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