Radiant Says Glencore Helped When Jefferies Probed Its Trades

(Bloomberg) — Glencore Plc spent months helping Radiant World to prepare a proposed settlement with Jefferies Financial Group Inc. after the US bank first raised questions about transactions it was financing, according to Radiant World’s $2 billion lawsuit against the mining company.

The account of the episode shines new light on the relationship between Glencore and Radiant World, which grew to become one of the world’s largest iron ore traders thanks in part to the larger company’s backing. The once-close relationship has ended in acrimony in recent weeks, with Glencore accusing Radiant World of faking invoices and emails and Radiant World initiating legal proceedings against Glencore.

In its statement of claim, a copy of which was seen by Bloomberg News, Radiant World said that Glencore’s attempts to resolve the issue between February and April this year — including offering to provide funds for $200 million to be paid to Jefferies — were “wholly inconsistent with the transactions being fictitious or fraudulent as Glencore later alleged.” Those actions came at a time when some lenders and counterparties were already beginning to back away from Radiant World amid concerns it had provided falsified documents to banks, Bloomberg has reported.

The lawsuit also offers a broader account of a commercial relationship that, in Radiant World’s telling, was unusually close and generated more than $100 million in annual gross profits for Glencore.

Radiant World, through its main Singapore operating company together with 10 other related entities including Sapphire Minmetals Corporation Ltd., is claiming for losses which it said it estimates at more than $2 billion.

It alleges that Glencore had made a binding agreement to continue trading with it and support its growth in the iron ore market in exchange for the repayment of a $1.1 billion debt incurred by Radiant World and associated companies in 2021. Glencore’s moves this year to cut ties and stop payments to Radiant World were a breach of that agreement, it claimed.

Glencore, in a statement on Tuesday, said that the claims were “meritless” and it would contest them vigorously. “Glencore has confirmed evidence that these companies sent falsified invoices and contracts as well as fabricated emails, which they fraudulently claimed to have received from Glencore personnel, to a number of financial institutions,” it said.

In a further comment in response to questions for this story, a Glencore spokesperson said: “Essentially, they are suing us for telling the truth about their fraud. The fact is that their own conduct is the reason for their situation and why several of their finance providers are suing them.”

Bloomberg has previously reported that Glencore had an extremely close relationship with Radiant World, trading extensively with it, helping it to secure financing and even acquiring warrants that gave it the option to take a minority stake.

In its lawsuit, Radiant World claims that part of the alleged 2021 agreement was that Glencore would help to bring investors and financiers to support its business, including by helping it to raise and maintain financing from Jefferies.

Glencore’s representations were made “with the knowledge and approval of Glencore’s most senior management,” Radiant World claimed, including Chief Executive Officer Gary Nagle, Chief Financial Officer Steve Kalmin and former CEO Ivan Glasenberg.

Lawyers for Jefferies contacted Glencore in early February 2026 over transactions financed by the bank and unpaid receivables, according to the lawsuit. Radiant World alleges that Glencore did not deny the transactions and continued discussing the matter through April, including potential payments of $69 million and $120 million from Glencore to Radiant World that could have helped fund a $200 million payment to Jefferies to resolve the matter.

The document does not say whether those payments were made. It also does not include the underlying correspondence or identify the receivables involved, and Bloomberg has not independently verified its account of the talks.

Radiant World confirmed it had filed the lawsuit in a statement on its website on Wednesday. A Jefferies spokesperson declined to comment. In its own legal filings, a fund run by the bank has said it entered into a “forbearance agreement” with Radiant World under which the company agreed to pay sums owing while Jefferies refrained from taking action against it.

The relationship between the two companies soured this year after banks began approaching Glencore with Radiant World invoices bearing its name that it couldn’t verify as genuine, Bloomberg previously reported. Jefferies has since accused Radiant World and Sapphire Minmetals of falsifying iron ore invoices as part of a “fraudulent scheme,” leading a London court to impose a $499 million worldwide freezing order against the companies.

Other elements of the claim are potentially embarrassing for Glencore. Radiant World repeated earlier claims that Glencore had an unusual degree of control over Radiant World’s own operations, approving new hires, advising on the pricing of physical trades and issuing instructions about the instruments, volumes and price levels of derivatives trades.

It said that Radiant World, Sapphire Minmetals, and several other companies including Quanterra International and Aspira Co. Pte had agreed in 2017 to undertake derivatives trading directly with Glencore “on a group basis.”

It also alleged that Glencore sought to keep parts of the relationship away from its formal records. Glencore favored oral communications and monthly in-person meetings, including in Singapore, and directed some transaction documents to be prepared and routed in non-standard ways, including through Glencore’s Delhi office, Radiant World claimed.

As a result, according to Radiant World, Glencore’s formal records didn’t fully reflect private arrangements or the true extent of the relationship. Glencore sought to keep the relationship out of formal records because of concerns over US Justice Department investigations into it and subsequent regulatory supervision following its guilty plea in 2022, Radiant World alleged.

–With assistance from Katherine Doherty.

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