Former UK-based Oil Worker, Stimler Pleads Guilty To Fraud Involving Nigerian Petroleum Officials

A former United Kingdom-based trader for Glencore Plc, Anthony Stimler, has pleaded guilty over what United States (US) prosecutors called his role in a scheme to bribe officials in Nigeria in exchange for favourable contracts from the country’s state-owned oil company.

Glencore, an Anglo-swiss company describes itself as one of the world’s largest globally diversified natural resource companies, founded in the 1970s as a trading company and is a major producer and marketer of commodities – employing 135,000 people around the world.

Stimler admitted to conspiring to both violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act(FCPA) and commit money laundering at a hearing in Manhattan federal court conducted by video, court records showed.

The company confirmed that Stimler had been an employee, and in a statement said it has cooperated with probes by the U.S. Department of Justice and other authorities, a Reuters report said.

“The conduct described in the plea is unacceptable and has no place in Glencore,” the company said.

Stimler will remain free in the United Kingdom on $500,000 bond, although his lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment, according an earlier Bloomberg news.

Prosecutors said millions of dollars in bribes were paid to officials in Nigeria and elsewhere, in exchange for Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) awarding oil contracts and providing “more lucrative grades of oil on more favourable delivery terms.”

Court papers referred to seven alleged co-conspirators from several countries in the bribery scheme, which prosecutors said ran from 2007 to 2018. None was charged or identified by name.

Stimler worked on Glencore’s West Africa desk from around 2002 to 2009 and again from around 2011 to 2019, court papers showed.

The Justice Department has been investigating Glencore’s business dealings in Nigeria, Venezuela and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

U.K. and Swiss authorities have also been examining possible corruption involving Glencore, and various governments have investigated other large oil traders.

In March, former Glencore oil trader Emilio Jose Heredia Collado pleaded guilty in San Francisco to manipulating a key oil price benchmark.

The oil trader, Glencore went on to say it had taken a number of remedial measures as a result of the investigation and has enhanced its ethics and compliance programme in recent years.

Stimler joined Glencore in 1999 and left in August 2019, with the executive paying bribes “to foreign officials in multiple countries, including Nigeria, on behalf of a commodity trading and mining company with global operations”.

Glencore received a subpoena from the US DoJ in 2018, looking at potential FCPA and money laundering issues in Nigeria Congo Kinshasa and Venezuela. Reuters at the time suggested the US was interested in links between Glencore and Nigeria’s Atlantic Energy.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) is also looking at Glencore’s activities. Specifically, around “corrupt practices in connection with commodities trading”.

The UK’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO), Brazil and Switzerland are also looking into various bribery allegations at the company.

Glencore has taken a number of legal hits recently. In March, a trader for the company was charged with conspiracy to manipulate fuel oil prices. This week, another legal filing reported Glencore had agreed to pay $9.85 million to settle allegations around price manipulation of zinc.