Miner Glencore to give $2bn to shareholders despite profit slump
Glencore is to give $2bn (£1.47bn) to shareholders after a turbulent year in which profits slumped and talks collapsed over a blockbuster $260bn merger with the fellow mining company Rio Tinto.The FTSE 100 company announced the payout on Wednesday despite reporting that annual profits slipped 6% on the previous year to $13.5bn.It comes weeks after talks over what would have been the largest deal in mining history collapsed, leaving the Swiss-headquartered commodities company to press ahead with a plan to more than double its copper production over the next decade.
Rising metals prices and an increase in copper output in the second half of the year were not enough to make up for a bruising fall in coal and energy commodity prices, which pulled earnings down,Glencore, which was established in 1974 as a trading company, has operations in more than 30 countries and a workforce of about 140,000,The idea of combining Rio and Glencore has been repeatedly floated over the past two decades and was raised the first time just before the global financial crisis in 2008,Rio rejected Glencore’s merger approach in 2014, while another round of talks in 2024 also came to nothing,The most recent attempts followed the $53bn deal between Anglo American and the Canadian rival Teck last September, which brought two of the world’s largest copper producers together.
Despite the failed deal, Gary Nagle, Glencore’s chief executive, said last year brought “significant progress” and pointed to “clear momentum for our copper-led growth strategy”.Copper has become central to Glencore’s future, with the metal increasingly in demand as the world builds out electric vehicles, renewable energy infrastructure and power grids.The company is targeting production of more than 1m tonnes of copper a year by the end of 2028, rising to 1.6m tonnes by 2035, which would make it one of the world’s largest producers.Glencore is the world’s sixth-largest copper producer and the largest listed coal producer.
Nagle justified the payout to investors by pointing to Glencore’s $4bn stake in Bunge, a US agricultural trader it received when Bunge merged with Glencore’s Viterra grain business last year, which he described as surplus capital being set aside for shareholders.Glencore has long been one of the world’s biggest coal traders, a business that has attracted criticism from climate campaigners but which the company argues is needed to keep the lights on in developing economies.In 2024 it scrapped plans to spin off its coal business after shareholders urged the commodities company to hold on to the highly profitable but heavily polluting division.
Brazilian butt lifts should be banned in UK amid ‘wild west’ industry, MPs say
Brazilian butt lifts should be banned in the UK, MPs have said, as a report found a lack of regulation had led to a “wild west” of cosmetic procedures being carried out in garden sheds, hotel rooms and public toilets.The women and equalities committee (WEC) said high risk procedures such as non-surgical buttock augmentation should be outlawed immediately, and a licensing system for lower risk treatments was urgently needed. People with no training can carry out potentially harmful procedures, putting the public at risk, the group of MPs added.A nine-month inquiry by the committee also found ministers were not moving quickly enough to tackle the risks posed to Britons and recommended they “accelerate regulatory action”. The lack of timely action was “fostering complacency in self-regulation” within the industry, they cautioned
UK shoppers warned over spread of harmful and illegal skin lightening kits
Illegal skin lightening products are being sold in an increasingly wide range of UK outlets, including butchers, specialist food shops and small grocery stores, trading standards officers have warned.The Chartered Trading Standards Institute (CTSI) is warning that many of the products contain substances that are banned because of the serious risks they pose to health, including skin damage, infections and pregnancy complications.Officers say that, as well as online, they are finding them more frequently in Asian and Arab stores, plus specialist butchers and grocery stores for other diverse communities, whom the products are primarily targeted at.Tendy Lindsay, former chair of the CTSI, said: “As a Black woman and a longstanding advocate for equality, diversity and inclusion, I want to be absolutely clear: the sale of illegal skin lightening products is not only dangerous, it is unlawful.“Many of these products contain banned substances such as high levels of hydroquinone, mercury or potent corticosteroids
‘It’s soul-crushing’: young people battle to find any work in bleak jobs market
On any given day, Poppy Blackman is engaged in the “soul-crushing” process of applying for a new job, and rarely ever hearing anything back.The 22-year-old has been unemployed since January 2025 and says she applies to an average of 50 roles a month, using one of four different CVs she has written for different types of jobs and sectors.“I can’t be picky with what I want to apply for,” says Blackman, who lives in London. She studied fashion and art design at North Kent College but has given up on only applying within this sector.“Not a day goes by when I don’t apply for at least a few jobs,” she says
Fostering target brings hope for thousands of children | Letter
Re your editorial (The Guardian view on fostering: reform is welcome, but excess profits must be tackled, 10 February), I’ll never forget the midnight feast that nobody ate. Four children sat shellshocked in my lounge, having just been removed from their home. They didn’t know or trust us. We tried our best to make them feel comfortable with cookies, doughnuts and crisps, but it would take several days before they were ready to tuck into treats.Fostering has been one of the biggest privileges for my wife and me over the past 20 years
Developers will only bring us more car-dependent sprawl | Letters
It is disappointing to see the huge urban sprawl at Gilston, north of Harlow, described as rejecting “car‑centric models” (A new town for the 21st century?, 9 February).Big, ultra-low-density developments like this, far from rail-transit networks, are inevitably car-dependent, despite claims by their promoters. It takes more than building the primary schools necessitated by such schemes to get people out of their cars, especially as walks to school are extended by the very low densities secured by huge consumption of productive farmland.Nor should the developers be given credit for “mixed tenure” housing. They managed to get East Herts council’s aspirations for 40% “affordable” housing reduced to 23%, using cynical “viability” provisions in planning guidance that enable developers to demand high rates of return and so reduce their obligations to provide affordable housing
Health support needed to tackle joblessness | Letter
The alarming rise in economic inactivity highlighted in your report (UK sleepwalking into joblessness epidemic, Tesco boss warns, 10 February) underlines a public health issue as much as an economic one. It is increasingly clear that millions of working-age people are drifting out of the labour market not through choice but because of long-term health problems and inadequate support systems around them.Tackling worklessness requires proactive, health-centred approaches that help individuals stay in or return to work. We also know that time out of work is corrosive. Good-quality work improves physical and mental wellbeing, providing income, social connection and purpose, and protects against social exclusion
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