# Glencore The Swiss commodity trader and miner that, until [[CMOC]] overtook it, was the world's largest cobalt producer — and the company whose Congolese assets are now the subject of the single largest transaction in the 2026 minerals-diplomacy story. ## The Congolese assets Two operations, both in the Katanga copper belt, both joint ventures with [[Gécamines]] and the Congolese state: - **Kamoto Copper Company (KCC)** — Glencore 75%, two open pits plus an underground mine - **Mutanda Mining (MUMI)** — Glencore 95%, three open pits. Once the largest cobalt mine in the world; placed on care and maintenance in 2019 during the price crash and restarted in 2022 Combined 2025 output: **247,800 tonnes of copper and 35,100 tonnes of cobalt.** Both received The Copper Mark in April 2025, the first African mines assessed against that standard's third revision. ## The corruption record In May 2022 Glencore pleaded guilty to foreign bribery and market-manipulation charges in the United States, United Kingdom and Brazil, paying **over $1.1 billion** in combined penalties. In December 2022 it reached a **separate $180 million settlement with the DRC** covering conduct between 2007 and 2018. The number that puts those settlements in perspective: in acquiring KCC, Glencore negotiated the signing bonus owed to Gécamines down from **$585 million to $140 million** — $445 million forgone by the Congolese state in one transaction, more than twice what the 2022 settlement returned. [[Dan Gertler]] was the intermediary throughout. ## The 2026 sale On **3 February 2026** Glencore signed a non-binding memorandum to sell **40% of its stakes in KCC and Mutanda at roughly $9 billion enterprise value** to the **Orion Critical Mineral Consortium** — Orion Resource Partners, Abu Dhabi's ADQ, and the **US International Development Finance Corporation**, with combined commitments above $5 billion. Glencore would retain operational management; the buyers would gain rights to direct their share of production to nominated buyers under the [[US-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement]]. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau said the deal "reflects the core objectives" of that agreement. > [!note] What is actually new here > A US government financing institution taking an equity position in Congolese copper-cobalt is a structural departure. It is the same instrument China used through Sicomines and the Tenke Fungurume acquisition, adopted by Washington and justified in explicitly national-security terms. Note also the timing: this is the first material dilution of Chinese ownership of DRC cobalt in a decade — and it is **still non-binding**, subject to due diligence and regulatory approval, and not closed as of August 2026. ## The cobalt quota squeeze Glencore cut cobalt output **39% year-on-year in Q1 2026** while raising copper 19%, drawing down inventory to fill its allocation under the DRC's ARECOMS quota regime. When ARECOMS ordered forfeiture of unused quotas on 30 June 2026, Glencore reportedly received a temporary extension on logistics grounds. Along with CMOC and Eurasian Resources Group it controls over 60% of permitted Congolese cobalt exports. ## See also [[CMOC]] · [[Gécamines]] · [[US-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement]] · [[Conflict Minerals Ecosystem]] · [[Critical Minerals]]