Glencore posts $5bn loss for 2015 against $2.3-bn gain in 2014

Debt-laden mining and commodities giant Glencore on Tuesday reported results deep in the red for 2015 due to plunging prices for metals and oil.

The Switzerland-based company posted a loss of $4.96 billion (4.5 billion euros) last year, compared to a net profit of $2.3 billion just a year earlier.

Not counting $6.3 billion in so-called significant items, including losses linked to bankruptcy proceedings at its optimum coal mine in South Africa, the company said it had raked in a net profit of $1.3 billion last year.

But even this adjusted profit ticked in 69 percent lower than in 2014.

Glencore saw its commodities marketing activities slide 11 percent to $2.7 billion, hit by a slumping metals market as well as by a strong base-line comparison on agricultural products in 2014.

But a "robust performance from oil marketing" helped slightly offset the downward trend.

The company's production activities plunged 38 percent to $6.0 billion, "reflecting lower prices in all key commodities."

Glencore had in September announced drastic moves to trim its then towering $30-billion debt, including suspending production at a number of mines and selling off assets.

The company said Tuesday that by the end of 2015, its debt had shrunk to $25.9 billion.

"Our rigorous focus on debt reduction, supply discipline and cost efficiencies enabled Glencore to record a robust performance in difficult market conditions," company chief executive Ivan Glasenberg said in the earnings statement.

He insisted that the company’s "diversified portfolio ... (and) highly resilient marketing business, underpins our ability to continue to be comfortably cash generative at current and even lower commodity prices."

Glencore said it was "confident" it would shed $4.0 to $5.0 billion in assets in 2016.

It is among other things expecting to sell off a minority stake in its agriculture products business and bring in bids for the potential disposal of its Cobar and/or Lomas Bayas mines by the end of the second quarter.