The industrial cobalt mining landscape in the Democratic Republic of Congo is defined by two dominant operations: Glencore’s Kamoto Copper Company (KCC) in Kolwezi and CMOC Group’s Tenke Fungurume Mining (TFM) complex southeast of the city. Together, these two operations account for approximately 45% of the DRC’s total cobalt output and roughly 33% of global mine production. Their strategies, expansion trajectories, and relationships with the Congolese state will determine the contours of global cobalt supply for the next decade.
Understanding the competitive dynamics between these two operations requires examining not just their geological and operational profiles, but the fundamentally different corporate philosophies they bring to the DRC’s challenging operating environment.
Glencore: The Integrated Trader
Glencore’s presence in the DRC cobalt sector is inseparable from its identity as a vertically integrated commodity trading house. KCC, which Glencore inherited through its 2013 merger with Xstrata and its earlier acquisition of Katanga Mining, operates one of the world’s largest cobalt-producing mine complexes, spanning both open-pit and underground operations across the Kamoto, Mashamba, and T17 ore bodies.
KCC’s production trajectory tells the story of Glencore’s operational approach. After a troubled period that included a full suspension of operations in 2015–2016 for a $900 million reconstruction program, KCC ramped steadily to approximately 42,000 tonnes of cobalt in 2025 — making it the single largest cobalt mine in the world. The reconstruction addressed chronic acid plant issues, tailings management failures, and underground stability problems that had plagued operations under previous ownership.
Glencore’s competitive advantage at KCC is not solely geological. The company’s trading arm provides a built-in offtake channel that eliminates market risk — cobalt hydroxide produced at KCC flows directly into Glencore’s global marketing network, which places it with refiners and battery materials producers worldwide. This integration means KCC can operate profitably at lower cobalt prices than standalone producers, because the trading margin captures value that independent mines must concede to intermediaries.
The company’s relationship with Gécamines, the DRC state mining company that holds a 25% stake in KCC (increased from 20% under the 2018 revised mining code), has been contentious. Gécamines has repeatedly challenged Glencore’s reported costs and revenue allocation, arguing that transfer pricing within Glencore’s integrated structure undervalues the cobalt sold from KCC, thereby reducing the dividends and royalty payments flowing to the Congolese state. A 2023 audit commissioned by Gécamines alleged more than $700 million in underpayments over a five-year period — an allegation Glencore has vigorously disputed.
This tension reflects a structural conflict inherent in the DRC’s mining partnerships: the state’s interest in maximizing fiscal revenue from its mineral assets frequently clashes with the operating strategies of multinational miners who optimize for group-level profitability rather than individual asset returns. Glencore’s integrated model, while commercially sophisticated, creates opacity that the DRC’s institutions are ill-equipped to penetrate.
CMOC: The Chinese Expansion Machine
CMOC Group’s trajectory in the DRC represents one of the most aggressive mining expansion plays of the past decade. The company acquired its 80% stake in Tenke Fungurume Mining from Freeport-McMoRan in 2016 for $2.65 billion, gaining control of one of the world’s premier copper-cobalt deposits. Since then, CMOC has invested heavily in expanding production capacity, transforming TFM from a mid-tier producer into a direct rival to KCC.
The numbers are striking. Tenke Fungurume’s cobalt output rose from approximately 16,000 tonnes in 2016 to over 31,000 tonnes in 2025, with the company’s 10,000 tonne-per-day processing expansion completed in 2024 and a further debottlenecking phase underway. CMOC’s stated ambition is to reach 40,000 tonnes of cobalt annual production by 2028, which would make Tenke Fungurume comparable to KCC in output.
CMOC’s expansion has been enabled by its access to Chinese state-backed financing and its position within China’s strategic supply chain for battery materials. The company’s cobalt hydroxide is sold predominantly to Chinese refiners — including Huayou Cobalt, CNGR Advanced Material, and GEM — who process it into battery-grade cobalt sulfate for CATL, BYD, and other cell manufacturers. This gives CMOC a captive market that insulates it from spot price volatility and ensures consistent offtake regardless of Western market conditions.
However, CMOC’s expansion has generated significant friction with the DRC government. In 2022, Gécamines accused CMOC of understating ore reserves and production volumes at Tenke Fungurume, effectively concealing the true scale of the deposit’s value from its Congolese partner. The dispute escalated into a formal government audit, a temporary export ban on CMOC’s production, and protracted negotiations that were only partially resolved through a $1.6 billion settlement and revised joint venture terms.
The Gécamines-CMOC dispute highlighted a pattern that recurs across Chinese mining investments in the DRC: rapid operational expansion accompanied by allegations of insufficient transparency with state partners. Several other Chinese-owned operations — including SICOMINES, the $6 billion minerals-for-infrastructure deal between China and the DRC — have faced similar scrutiny over the actual value of minerals extracted versus the declared figures used to calculate the state’s share.
Geological Endowment and Reserve Life
Both KCC and TFM sit atop world-class geological endowments, but their deposit characteristics differ in ways that shape operational strategy.
KCC’s ore bodies are predominantly sulfide deposits accessed through both open-pit and underground mining. The underground operations at Kamoto and KOV (Kamoto Oliveira Virgule) access higher-grade ore at depth, but at significantly higher cost per tonne than open-pit extraction. KCC’s published reserves support a mine life extending beyond 2040, though the reserve base has been subject to repeated revisions reflecting the geological complexity of the Central African Copperbelt’s folded and faulted stratigraphy.
Tenke Fungurume’s deposits are oxide ores amenable to acid leaching and solvent extraction-electrowinning (SX-EW) — a processing route that is generally lower cost than the sulfide flotation and roasting circuits used at KCC. TFM’s geology also offers substantial exploration upside: the mining lease covers a 1,500-square-kilometer concession area where only a fraction of identified mineralization has been brought into production.
This geological distinction has commercial implications. KCC’s sulfide processing produces cobalt hydroxide as a by-product of copper production through a complex hydrometallurgical circuit that requires expensive reagents and generates significant acid plant emissions. TFM’s oxide processing is simpler, more scalable, and better suited to the rapid capacity additions that CMOC has pursued.
The Mutanda Question
Glencore’s second major DRC cobalt asset — Mutanda Mining, which was the world’s largest cobalt mine before KCC’s expansion — has been in a state of strategic ambiguity since it was placed on care and maintenance in late 2019. Glencore cited low cobalt prices as the rationale for suspending operations, but the decision also reflected asset-management logic: restricting supply to support prices while redirecting operational focus to the higher-grade, lower-cost KCC.
Mutanda’s potential restart remains one of the most consequential variables in the global cobalt supply equation. The mine has a nameplate capacity of approximately 27,000 tonnes of cobalt annually. Its full restart would add roughly 15% to global supply — a volume large enough to depress prices significantly if brought online during a period of weak demand.
Glencore has signaled that Mutanda’s restart is contingent on “sustainable cobalt market conditions,” which industry observers interpret as a price floor of approximately $30,000–$35,000 per tonne sustained over multiple quarters. As of early 2026, cobalt prices have been oscillating around $27,000–$29,000, suggesting that a full restart remains some distance away — though partial restart of the most economic pits could be viable at current prices.
The strategic implication is clear: Glencore holds a supply option that it can exercise to capture upside in a rising market, while using the threat of restart to discourage competitors from over-expanding. This is a classic Glencore play — managing supply to optimize trading revenue rather than maximizing volume.
Processing and Downstream Integration
A critical dimension of the Glencore-CMOC rivalry is the extent of downstream integration. Glencore’s cobalt marketing is handled by its global trading division, which sells hydroxide to refiners across multiple jurisdictions — Umicore in Belgium, Freeport Cobalt in Finland, and Chinese processors. This geographic diversification provides resilience against trade disruptions and enables Glencore to optimize sales across different refining markets.
CMOC’s downstream integration is oriented almost exclusively toward China. The company’s hydroxide is processed predominantly in Chinese refining complexes that supply the domestic battery supply chain. While this provides a reliable and growing market, it creates concentration risk: any disruption to Chinese-DRC trade relations, or any shift in Chinese industrial policy regarding cobalt sourcing, could leave CMOC exposed.
This downstream orientation reflects a broader pattern in the DRC cobalt sector. Chinese companies now control approximately 70% of the DRC’s cobalt refining capacity, through both wholly-owned facilities and joint ventures with Congolese partners. The integrated Chinese supply chain — from DRC mine to Chinese refiner to Chinese battery manufacturer to Chinese EV producer — represents the most complete vertical integration in the global battery materials landscape.
Labor, Community, and Social License
Both Glencore and CMOC face persistent challenges in maintaining social license to operate in Katanga. The industrial Copperbelt is densely populated, with mining concessions frequently overlapping with communities, farmland, and informal settlements. Artisanal miners routinely encroach on industrial concessions, creating safety hazards and security confrontations that generate negative publicity.
Glencore has invested heavily in community development programs around KCC, including infrastructure, healthcare facilities, and education initiatives. The company’s social reporting is relatively transparent by DRC standards, though critics argue that the scale of community investment remains disproportionate to the value extracted.
CMOC’s community engagement has been more controversial. Reports by Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have documented forced relocations, inadequate compensation for displaced communities, and security incidents at the Tenke Fungurume perimeter. CMOC has responded with improved resettlement programs and community investment, but the company’s rapid expansion — which requires continuous acquisition of new land within the concession — creates ongoing friction.
The Next Five Years
The competitive balance between Glencore and CMOC in the DRC cobalt sector will be shaped by several converging factors:
Price trajectory: If cobalt prices recover toward $35,000+ sustained, Glencore’s Mutanda restart becomes likely, dramatically expanding its DRC output and reasserting its global supply dominance. If prices remain in the $25,000–$30,000 range, CMOC’s lower-cost oxide processing gives it a structural advantage.
State relations: The DRC government under President Félix Tshisekedi has signaled increasing assertiveness in extracting value from mining partnerships. Both companies face potential renegotiation of joint venture terms, increased royalty rates, and more aggressive auditing of reported costs and revenues.
Battery chemistry evolution: The LFP versus NMC dynamic directly affects cobalt demand growth. If NMC maintains its position in premium vehicles and LFP growth stabilizes, cobalt demand growth supports expansion at both operations. If LFP penetrates the premium segment — as BYD’s Blade battery suggests is possible — cobalt demand growth may disappoint.
Geopolitical risk: Western efforts to reduce dependence on Chinese-controlled critical mineral supply chains could create opportunities for non-Chinese operators to secure premium offtake agreements with European and American battery manufacturers. Glencore is better positioned than CMOC to capitalize on this trend, given its diversified customer base and Western corporate domicile.
The DRC Copperbelt remains the epicenter of global cobalt supply. How Glencore and CMOC navigate its geological opportunities and institutional challenges will determine whether the EV revolution’s most critical supply chain constraint is resolved — or deepened.