LONDON, July 6, 2026, 13:05 (BST)
- Glencore plc (LON:GLEN) slipped around 0.6% to 510.5p in London as the FTSE 100 also edged down. The LSE was open for its usual Monday trading.
- The stock has fallen roughly 14% in the past four weeks, despite latest LME copper stocks being 16.6% lower than on June 3.
- Glencore’s next test comes on July 29 with its production report. Its guidance leans to more copper and coal in the second half.
- Glencore could face some risk to its battery-metals business after a cobalt export quota issue in Congo, sources said.
Glencore plc (LON:GLEN) slipped 0.6% to around 510.5 pence on Monday in London, underperforming a weak mining sector. Traders shrugged off low copper stockpiles and focused on the company’s July output update. The London Stock Exchange trades from 0800 to 1630 local, with London at 1305 BST.
FTSE 100 edged down 0.1% to 10,663.68 by 1037 GMT, Reuters said, as weaker precious metal miners pushed against financials. Glencore barely moved in today’s trading. The bigger point is the stock has dropped roughly 14% over the last month, despite copper’s visible LME draws still giving bulls something to hold onto.
| London snapshot | Price/index level | Day move |
|---|---|---|
| Glencore (LON:GLEN) | ~510.5p | -0.6% |
| Rio Tinto LON:RIO | ~7,023p | -0.7% |
| Anglo American LON:AAL | ~3,761p | -0.6% |
| Antofagasta (LON:ANTO) | ~3,865p | -0.1% |
| FTSE 100 (INDEXFTSE:UKX) | 10,663.68 | -0.1% |
Peer data shown above used delayed quotes from Google Finance. The FTSE 100 value is from Reuters’ London market report at 1037 GMT.
The gap is wide. Westmetall’s latest LME data puts three-month copper at $13,345 a ton on July 3, which is 4.2% lower than June 3. LME copper stocks slipped to 318,900 tons from 382,550 in that time, a 16.6% drop. Glencore hasn’t moved just on falling visible stocks.
This is important since Glencore’s upcoming report will focus more on run-rate than spot copper. The company set July 29 for its half-year production report and August 5 for half-year results.
| Glencore 2026 guide test | 2026 guide | H1 weighting | Q1 output | Implied Q2 output to hit H1 weighting |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Copper | 810-870 kt | 48% | 199.6 kt | 189-218 kt |
| Steelmaking coal | 30-34 mt | 44% | 6.5 mt | 6.7-8.5 mt |
| Energy coal | 95-100 mt | 46% | 22.9 mt | 20.8-23.1 mt |
Glencore’s implied Q2 numbers come from its Q1 production and full-year guidance. The company said copper output was up 19% year-on-year in Q1, reaching 199,600 tons. Cobalt dropped 39%, and zinc was down 17%.
Glencore CEO Gary Nagle said in the April production report that 2026 guidance is still the same. He said higher commodity prices could more than make up for cost pressure from diesel, acid and the weaker dollar. Nagle also said Q1 marketing performance was tracking above the top end of Glencore’s long-term adjusted EBIT range of $2.3 billion to $3.5 billion a year.
Cobalt is the latest development. Reuters said Friday that top cobalt miners in Democratic Republic of Congo could miss out on first-half export quotas after a glitch on a customs platform. Congo is home to Glencore and CMOC, the top two cobalt producers worldwide, and produces about 70% of the global supply, according to Reuters.
Quota risk isn’t the main driver for Glencore profits, but it does hit the same African metals portfolio that pushed up Q1 copper figures. Reuters reported Congo gave a July 5 deadline for first-half quotas. Up to 20,000 tons of exports are at risk, an industry source told Reuters, worth about $1.1 billion at current prices.
Energy turned lower. Oil dropped Monday after OPEC+ said it would lift output targets from August and shipments through the Strait of Hormuz picked up. Brent slipped 0.57% to $71.71 a barrel at 0942 GMT, according to Reuters. PVM’s Tamas Varga said sellers faced “little hope” for a quick price recovery as they dumped into weakness. Reuters
The old M&A premium isn’t top of mind now. Rio Tinto LON:RIO dropped out of talks with Glencore in February, scrapping a merger plan that could have built a miner worth more than $200 billion, according to Reuters. At the time, Jefferies analyst Christopher LaFemina said Glencore still had options to “unlock value,” but said an all-share takeover premium looked like the fastest way to boost the share price. Reuters
Glencore is trading around 510.5p, which is down about 28% from its 52-week high of 707.2p but still up 86% from its 52-week low at 275.2p. The July 29 report will need to clarify if the focus on copper and coal for the back half is strategy or pressure.
