GLEN Glencore Plc

--Glencore posted a $2.6 billion net loss, as it booked significant impairments to reflect lower commodity prices.

--Adjusted earnings fell to $4.83 billion but beat market consensus.

--The miner said it wouldn't paid dividends for 2020.

By Jaime Llinares Taboada

Glencore PLC swung to a loss for the first half of the year on a worse underlying performance and significant impairments, and scrapped its dividend payments for 2020.

The FTSE 100 miner on Thursday posted a net loss of $2.6 billion for the six months ended June 30 compared with a $226 million profit a year earlier. This was driven by impairments of $3.2 billion as a result of lower commodity prices related to the uncertainty arising from the coronavirus pandemic.

Adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization fell to $4.83 billion from $5.58 billion. However, this was above the market consensus of $4.29 billion--taken from the company's website and based on 14 forecasts.

Chief Executive Ivan Glasenberg said the performance reflected the countercyclical earnings power from Glencore's large-scale marketing activities. "Marketing delivered a half-yearly record adjusted EBI performance of $2.0 billion, allowing us to raise full-year guidance to the top end of our long-term $2.2 [billion]-$3.2 billion range," he said.

However, Glencore said that its outlook remains uncertain and it wouldn't pay dividends for the current year.

"Notwithstanding our cash-generative business and secure liquidity positions, the board has concluded that it would be inappropriate to make a distribution to shareholders in 2020, instead prioritizing the acceleration of net debt reduction to within our target range (<$16 billion), currently expected to occur by the end of 2020."

Shares at 0745 GMT were down 6.06 pence, or 3.1%, at 190.14 pence.

Write to Jaime Llinares Taboada at jaime.llinares@wsj.com; @JaimeLlinaresT

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 06, 2020 04:10 ET (08:10 GMT)

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