Court tells Glencore to pay $313M for African bribes

LONDON — A British court last week ordered commodities company Glencore to pay more than $313 million for using bribes to bolster its oil profits in five African countries.

The order comes months after the Anglo-Swiss company announced it had reached deals with authorities in the U.S., Britain and Brazil to resolve corruption allegations.

Glencore pleaded guilty in June to seven counts of bribery after an investigation launched by the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office in 2019 found it paid bribes worth a combined $29 million to gain access to oil in Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea, Ivory Coast, Nigeria and South Sudan.

The fraud office said the penalty is the largest for one of its cases and is the first time a company was convicted for authorizing bribery instead of just failing to prevent it under a 2010 law.

“The facts demonstrate not only significant criminality but sophisticated devices to disguise it,” Judge Peter Fraser of the Southwark Crown Court said in sentencing Glencore, adding that the bribery was “endemic” among traders and took place over an extended period.

Glencore, which is headquartered in Baar, Switzerland, said it cooperated with the British investigation and “engaged in an extensive program of corporate reform.”

“The conduct that took place was inexcusable and has no place in Glencore,” Chairman Kalidas Madhavpeddi said in a statement.

The British investigation found that the company would fly large amounts of cash by private plane to bribe officials in oil and gas companies and government ministries in African countries.

Cash withdrawals were masked in financial reports as charges like service fees, signing bonuses and office expenses.

Following similar allegations in other countries, Glencore agreed to pay penalties totaling up to $1.5 billion to resolve all the investigations, included bribery accusations in the United States and Brazil as well as a market manipulation case in the U.S.