Glencore CEO Glasenberg Set to Reap $163 Million in 2011 Dividend Payouts
By Jesse Riseborough - Aug 25, 2011 4:49 AM ET .
Ivan Glasenberg, chief executive officer and largest holder of Glencore International Plc, is set to reap a dividend of about $163 million for 2011 amid a 24 percent slump in the stock from its May initial public offering.
The world’s biggest listed commodities trader will make a first interim payout of 5 cents a share, it said in a statement today. That implies a full-year distribution of about 15 cents based on a company policy of the first-half dividend comprising one-third of the 12-month payment. Glasenberg, 54, owns 15.7 percent of the Baar, Switzerland-based company, .
Glencore shares have plunged since the sale of $10 billion in stock preceded a global equity sell-off. The IPO, the biggest in the world this year, attracted 12 cornerstone investors including BlackRock Inc. and Abu Dhabi’s Aabar Investments PJSC. Glasenberg’s holding in the company is worth about $7 billion at current prices.
“Since the IPO it is upsetting that the market has come down, that investors who supported us during the IPO do see their investments under water,” Glasenberg told reporters today on a conference call from London. “That is not good for us, it’s not good for them. However, we can not control markets.”
The company will distribute $346 million in dividends for the first half, which will be paid on Sept. 30, it said.
The stock advanced for a fourth day today, gaining 3.7 percent to 404 pence in London. The company sold shares in the May IPO at 530 pence apiece. Glencore today reported a 57 percent increase in first-half net income before other significant items to $2.45 billion from a year earlier.
“There will be a few battered and bruised IPO investors,” Greg Smith, managing director of Fat Prophets, said in an interview with Maryam Nemazee on Bloomberg Television’s “The Pulse” in London. “The float was effectively, looking back, near the top of the market and many will be nursing of paper losses of 20 percent or more.” The dividend will offer “some compensation,” he said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jesse Riseborough in London at jriseborough@bloomberg.net
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