Glencore soars by 20% in London

The shares rose as much as 20 percent to 114.45 pence by 8:07 a.m. local time.

Cape Town – global resources group Glencore, recently hit by doubts about its financial health, said on Monday that it had no market-sensitive information to release that could explain the recent large price and volume movements in its share price. On Friday, Reuters reported that Glencore is in talks with a Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund, a Chinese grain trader known as COFCO, along with Canadian pension funds, to sell a stake in the Canadian agriculture assets that operates under the Viterra banner. Last month, Glencore raised $2.5-billion to whittle down debt and suspended two dividend payments.

The agricultural business may be worth as much as $10 billion, Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. said in a report on Monday.

Mining stocks and commodities were also helped on Monday by data last week that showed US employers added fewer jobs than expected, dimming prospects for an increase in USA interest rates and weakening the dollar.

That sent its shares (which are traded in relatively lower volumes in Hong Kong) bouncing as high as HK$18.36 (£1.56), before they fell back to HK$12.60.

There is an increasing possibility that with the sale of the agricultural unit, the company will be able to reduce its debt significantly.

The analysts at London advisory firm Bernstein said that sale of the agriculture assets were well advanced.

Shares in the Swiss-based firm have fluctuated wildly amid investor fears that sinking commodity prices will affect its ability to meet outstanding debt obligations.

Shares gained 7% or 6.45p to 101.45p today as weekend reports suggested chief executive Ivan Glasenberg open to a bid at the right price, but believes that there are no suitors prepared to stump up enough in the current depressed commodity markets. Glencore’s market capitalisation has halved since the start of the year.