Trafigura prepays US$200 million to snap up Ivanhoe’s Congo copper
Trafigura Group agreed to pay US$200 million for copper anodes from an Ivanhoe Mines Ltd. smelter in the Democratic Republic of Congo that’s due to start up in September.
Trafigura signed the prepayment agreement last month, Ivanhoe said Tuesday in a statement. The deal shows global trading houses, from Mercuria Energy Group to Vitol Group, are continuing to stump up cash to secure future volumes of the metal as competition for supply heats up.
The world’s biggest copper trader will take 20% of the Congo smelter’s anodes for three years, with interest paid at the secured overnight financing rate, or SOFR, plus 3.75%, the statement shows. Ivanhoe’s joint-venture partners – China’s CITIC Metal Ltd. and Zijin Mining Group, account for the remaining 80%.
The 500,000-ton-a-year smelter, set to be the largest on the African continent, is part of Ivanhoe’s massive Kamoa-Kakula complex, where mining has been disrupted by seismic activity and flooding since May.
Kamoa Copper, the Ivanhoe subsidiary that runs the complex, also extended a US$200 million loan facility with South Africa’s Standard Bank for a further 12 months, it said.
