The move propels Hayward – “vilified” for his role in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill – back into the corporate limelight at one of London’s largest companies.

Already a director, Hayward will take the chairman’s role until a replacement is found and will run the nominations committee, key as Glencore rebuilds its board. He is not, though, in the running to take the job permanently.

The clean-up at the top on Thursday was abrupt and fast – handing Glencore a freer hand to restructure the combined company as it begins a three-month evaluation period since the merger closed earlier this month.

It also puts paid to any lingering notion that the deal could have been a merger of equals and raises questions about whether new directors can be strong enough to act as effective counterpoints to Glencore’s pugnacious chief executive and largest shareholder, Ivan Glasenberg.

Investors and analysts had expected Glencore to put its stamp on the combined miner and trader following the mining industry’s largest takeover, but former Xstrata chairman John Bond’s ousting with immediate effect was unexpected, as he was already due to leave.

Bond announced his exit at the start of Glencore Xstrata’s first annual general meeting. Voting results showed almost 81 percent of voting shareholders opposed his nomination.

Shareholders also voted against the reelection of three other Xstrata directors – Con Fauconnier, Peter Hooley and Ian Strachan. A fourth director, Steve Robson, resigned earlier.

Bond, a former banking heavyweight and City veteran, had agreed last November to stand down as chairman – quitting after coming under fire over a 140 million pound ($223 million) “golden handcuffs” package for key Xstrata managers.

“I recognize and respect the strong opposition among many to the retention arrangements which the board felt appropriate to ensure management stability,” he said on Thursday.

Glencore managers own almost 25 percent of the group, making them the largest group of shareholders, but under the terms of the merger Glasenberg could not oppose Xstrata directors.

A new chairman is expected to be appointed by the end of the year, a second source with knowledge of the matter said.

GLENCORE TEST AHEAD

For Hayward, who said he felt “demonized and vilified” over the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, the appointment at Glencore is a return to the top at a major UK-listed resource firm.

His appointment to the board in 2011 had already been read as a comeback for a man still in demand for his decades of oil-industry experience, technical knowledge and contacts book.

But for both Glencore and Hayward, the process of replacing Bond and the departed board members will be a major test for the company’s governance credentials.

Glencore was criticized in 2011, at the time of its listing, for its appointment of Hong Kong veteran and colorful former legionnaire Simon Murray as chairman. Analysts and investors questioned whether he would stand up to Glasenberg.

Murray was replaced by Bond after the merger.

(Editing by Philippa Fletcher)

Bond gave no explanation, but as the meeting began in Zug, Switzerland, he handed responsibility for chairing the gathering to former BP (BP.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) boss Tony Hayward, the company’s senior independent director.

The results of the shareholder vote are due to be published by Glencore shortly.

A veteran of London’s financial sector who was formerly chairman of miner Xstrata, Bond agreed last November to stand down once Glencore and Xstrata merged, quitting after coming under fire over a 140 million pound ($223 million) “golden handcuffs” package for key Xstrata managers.

But he had been due to leave only after a replacement was found and his abrupt ousting is likely to raise questions over governance at the company, whose shares are still largely held by its top managers.

Glencore was widely criticized for its appointment of Hong Kong veteran and former legionnaire Simon Murray as chairman at the time of its stock market listing, as analysts and investors questioned whether he would act as a sufficient counterpoint to CEO and top shareholder Ivan Glasenberg.

Murray was replaced by Bond after the merger.

(Editing by David Holmes)

Gunvor outlined the plans in its first prospectus to
investors as it seeks to raise at least $200 million via a bond
issue. The firm is co-owned by Gennady Timchenko, seen as one of
the closest allies of Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Gunvor’s rival Glencore several years ago began its
journey to a record share offering by issuing a prospectus for
its debut bond to introduce investors to its structure and
strategy.

Gunvor has said it has no plans for a listing in the short
or medium term.

“The global market opportunity set for independent
traders… continues to grow as major producers of crude oil and
refined products, especially the large integrated oil companies,
place increasing emphasis on upstream exploration, development
and production and reduce emphasis on their other traditional
downstream activities, which include refining and marketing,”
Gunvor said.

It added that changes brought by the U.S. shale oil
production boom and increasing demand from high-growth emerging
markets in Asia were creating new opportunities for traders to
play a more active role in shifting global oil flows.

“Gunvor continues to consider new investments in oil
products terminals, LNG (liquefied natural gas) terminals, mini
refineries and downstream facilities in Latin America, Africa,
Central Asia and South Asia,” it said.

Gunvor has long dominated trade of Russian oil but has
significantly cut its exposure over the past year. It has bought
coal assets in Russia and the United States, two refineries in
Europe and built new storage capacity over the past few years.

Gunvor said its management considered Vitol, Trafigura,
Mercuria and Glencore Xstrata as its main competitors with
similar business models and attitude to beefing up physical
assets.

New assets have allowed Gunvor to raise revenues steeply
although profit margins have thinned, reflecting broader trends
in the trading industry.

The company said its revenues rose to $93.1 billion in 2012
from $87.3 billion in 2011. Net profit fell to $301.1 million in
2012 from $329.7 million a year earlier.

This resulted in annual profit margin of just 0.32 percent
although core earnings or EBITDA have risen by 7 percent in 2012
to $575 million. Gunvor said it had made its record profit of
$621.2 million back in 2009, when market volatility was big.

Large commodity trading houses with tens of billions of
dollars in annual revenue have often struggled to convert higher
traded volumes into profits.

Glencore has said its margins in the oil sector are below 1
percent and top oil trader Vitol had a gross margin
of just 0.8 percent in 2011 – the last year for which data was
available.

TWO SHAREHOLDERS

Gunvor’s spectacular growth from a small trader into one of
the world’s top houses in just 10 years has sparked criticism
from Russian opposition figures, who have said the firm has
benefitted from Timchenko’s political connections.

The company and Timchenko have repeatedly denied it has
enjoyed any special favours.

Gunvor said only two men have voting shareholder rights,
Timchenko and chief executive Torbjorn Tornqvist, who each have
50 percent in the company.

“A disagreement between the two controlling shareholders
could prevent key strategic decisions from being made,” the
company warned in the prospectus describing all existing risks
to its businesses.

“In the event these shareholders are unable to continue to
collaborate effectively with each other and with other
management, Gunvor’s business could be materially harmed,” it
added.

It also said some of its senior employees owned non-voting
shares, representing 12.3 percent of capital and due to increase
to 12.8 percent in May-June.

In 2012, a one-off award of equity-settled share-based
payment to senior employees amounted to $83.6 million, it said,
in a move that could have reduced total net profits for that
year.

Gunvor said it employed 1,634 people as of the end of 2012,
including 503 terminal operators, 604 refinery workers and 493
in trading.

(Additional reporting by Olesya Astakhova in Moscow; Editing by
Anthony Barker)

Craig Pirrong, a University of Houston academic confirmed he
was the author of the study commissioned by the Global Financial
Markets Association (GFMA).

He said the GFMA, chaired by bank JP Morgan’s head of global
commodities Blythe Masters, had hoped to use the study to
influence the Financial Stability Board (FSB), a global watchdog
that has been examining regulation of commodity trading.

“I call them like I see them. GFMA didn’t like that. I
wouldn’t change the call, so they sat on the report,” Pirrong
wrote in his blog “Streetwise Professor” on Monday.

In another posting Pirrong argued that commodity traders,
unlike large banks, are not regarded as “too big to fail”.

GFMA, a body linking three major financial trade
associations in Europe, Asia and North America that lobbies on
regulatory issues, denied that the report had remained in draft
form because its findings did not suit the group.

“GFMA often commissions research which is shared with the
regulatory community and not published more widely,” it said in
an emailed statement.

The FSB is studying the role of commodity traders as part of
two separate reviews of the shadow banking system and
systemically important financial institutions.

This work could result in new restrictions for the
relatively lightly regulated commodity trading sector, which
competes with banks in areas such as commodities lending.

The report for the GFMA could, however, justify lighter
regulations for commodity traders than for banks and, in the
eyes of banks, entrench an unfair advantage.

The Financial Times on Monday quoted the study commissioned
by the GFMA as saying that large trading companies, such as
Glencore or Vitol, “pose less systemic
risks” than large banks.

The newspaper quoted people familiar with the situation as
saying the report remained in draft form after its conclusions
did not meet the group’s expectations.

The GFMA declined to provide Reuters with a copy of the
report but said it had been made available to regulators.

“In this case, in July 2012, we shared a draft of the report
with key policymakers and regulators from all over the world,
including the Financial Stability Board (FSB), the Securities
and Exchange Commission in the US and the UK’s Financial
Services Authority.”

The regulatory burden on banks is growing.

They face more stringent capital requirements under the new
Basel III restrictions aimed at reducing systemic risk after the
2008 crisis, during which some banks were bailed out having been
judged “too big to fail” because their collapse would endanger
the financial system.

In one of his blogs, Pirrong wrote: “I know…that major
banks involved in commodity markets are chafing under the
restrictions imposed on them, and resent the fact that commodity
firms that are their competitors in certain activities are not
subject to the same restrictions.”

Vitol, which is also a Sterling shareholder, said in
February it would offer C$192 million ($190 million) for
Sterling, giving it a foothold in the North Sea oil and gas
sector.

Many large commodity trading houses have sought to secure
physical assets such as oilfields or aluminium smelters as part
of a bid to extend their control over supply chains.

“Vitol never made a final bid. The fact that they did not
leaves it in abeyance,” Sterling Chief Executive Mike Azancot
told Reuters via telephone on Monday.

Vitol declined to comment on the reasons for abandoning its
takeover plans. Last month, Vitol said that it had not proceeded
with an offer because Sterling had not provided an independent
valuation of the company.

Sterling said in April that the Vitol offer did not
represent fair value for the company.

As part of a strategic review which Azancot said was
prompted by the Vitol offer, a group of Sterling shareholders
have proposed replacing its Chairman Walt DeBoni with a former
Centrica executive Jacob Ulrich.

A decision will be made on June 11.

Sterling’s share price has fallen by more than 50 percent
since this time last year. At the end of 2012, Sterling had a
total financial debt of 87.9 million pounds ($135 million).

Sterling, which has sought to raise funds to develop its
long-delayed Breagh gas field in the North Sea, on April 17
issued a $225 million secured bond.

Azancot said that the company expected its first gas
production in August.

Provisional turnover was a record 136 million tonnes versus
122 million in 2011, while crude accounted for just 30 percent
of the total, according to a presentation given by David Fyfe,
Gunvor’s head of market research and analysis.

In past years, crude oil constituted up to 60 percent of its
business. Like most private trading houses, Gunvor does not
publish profit figures and publishes 2012 revenue figures later
in the year.

Gunvor, once the dominant trading house in Russia’s seaborne
exports, surprised traders last year when it obtained no access
to Russian crude in tenders. The firm has said this is
consistent with its long-term strategy to expand into new areas
such as metals and natural gas and boost oil product flows, such
as from its Ust-Luga fuel terminal.

Fyfe said some of the best growth prospects for traders are
in oil products. This is partly due to shifting global flows as
U.S. shale production increases fuel exports and provides
opportunities for nimble middlemen to exploit regional price
dislocations, he said.

“Global products trade may grow faster than crude in the
next decade,” he said in a talk in Geneva late on Wednesday.

“Crude will remain very important for us but increasingly
refined products is the sphere where we see growing
opportunities in terms of producing, shipping and blending going
forward,” he added.

Gunvor, like many of its rivals such as Vitol and Trafigura,
has also increased its investment in physical assets as it seeks
to extend control over supply chains.

Last year, Gunvor purchased two oil refineries in Europe
from insolvent refiner Petroplus.

Fyfe said he expected further consolidation in the European
refining sector generally and that 2013 was likely to bring
worse margins than the previous year.

“We had an unexpected period of healthy margins for both our
(refining) assets in 2012 … Could 2013 be more difficult in
terms of margins than 2012? Yes, quite likely it will be,” he
said.

(editing by Jane Baird)

Luis Barcenas, accused by Spanish authorities of abusing his position to secure bribes, evading taxes and laundering money is at the heart of a growing corruption scandal that has hurt the conservative People’s Party and Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy.

Spanish court proceedings indicate that Barcenas held up to 38 million euros ($49.61 million) in Swiss bank accounts.

“If the suspicions of money laundering are confirmed, if bribes were paid, we will confiscate the money and then we will discuss (with Spain) what happens to it,” said prosecutor Jean-Bernard Schmid in a telephone interview.

He added the investigation would focus on examining the bank accounts in more detail and checking the origins of the funds.

Barcenas, a mountaineer who once scaled Everest, is also part of a second Spanish corruption investigation involving a secret ledger of cash donations from construction magnates that was purportedly redistributed to party officials.

The probes have enraged Spaniards at a time when deep recession has pushed unemployment to 26 percent and the government has slashed public spending.

He has denied any wrongdoing, saying the ledger was forged and that the money in Switzerland was obtained from legitimate business activities.

Schmid said Swiss authorities would check to ensure the banks concerned in the case had complied with Swiss laws which require them to take additional measures to determine the source of funds held by so-called Politically Exposed Persons, or PEPs.

“The bank is supposed to pay attention (with PEPs) so we will see if this was done properly and if flags should have been raised and more research done,” he added.

Documents from the evidence file of the Spanish examining magistrate seen by Reuters have shown that Barcenas held deposits in Dresdner Bank, since acquired by Liechtenstein’s top bank LGT.

“As far as LGT is concerned, we have always complied with the relevant laws and cooperated with the competent authorities,” said a spokesperson for the bank on Monday.

Swiss broadcaster RTS reported on Friday that Barcenas also held an account with Geneva private bank Lombard Odier.

Lombard Odier did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

($1 = 0.7659 euros)

(Reporting by Emma Farge; Additional reporting by Julien Toyer in Madrid; Editing by Jon Hemming)

The Financial Stability Board (FSB) – a task force set up by
the G20 group of major economies to improve global financial
regulation in the wake of the 2008 crisis – has asked national
and regional regulators to determine whether commodity traders
should come under the scope of new rules.

Among the aims of the Basel-based FSB is to limit risk in
the $60 trillion “shadow banking” sector of non-banks, such as
hedge funds and money market funds, that lend money without the
regulatory framework of banks.

The FSB included commodity traders – most of which are
privately-held, Swiss-based companies that traditionally operate
with little regulatory scrutiny – in a study of shadow banking
completed late last year. The FSB will present recommendations
on shadow banking to G20 leaders in September.

“Enhanced monitoring is the crucial first step and thus,
commodity traders may be subject to regulatory reporting (to
authorities) or additional required disclosures to the market on
their activities and risks,” said Svein Andresen, Secretary
General of the FSB in an emailed response to Reuters’ questions
on Wednesday.

Commodity traders have traditionally relied on European
banks for financing, but some of those banks have cut back on
lending because of tougher capital requirements under new rules
to make banks safer.

Big commodity trading houses have themselves stepped into
the breach, using their own liquidity to lend money to other
parties in the commodity supply chain, although such loans are
still thought to represent just a small sliver of their overall
business.

If commodity traders are included under new rules for shadow
banking, policymakers could introduce transparency rules or even
capital requirements.

So far, Andresen said the involvement of commodity traders
in shadow banking is thought to be limited “as they usually do
not extend credit using borrowed funds and involving maturity
transformation”, referring to the potentially risky practice of
borrowing cash over one timeframe and lending it over another.

“Nevertheless, authorities have to be attentive to new
innovations in the markets (such as the securitisation of
commodity trade finance) which may change the general perception
towards commodity traders’ involvement in shadow banking,” he
added in the emailed response.

NICE EARNER

The FSB is also considering the role of commodity trading
firms as part of a review that aims to identify financial
institutions which are systemically important and therefore
require special oversight.

The Bank of Canada’s Deputy Governor Timothy Lane said last
September that large trading houses were playing an increasingly
prominent role in commodity markets and may become systemically
important.

The top ten commodity trading firms have collective revenues
of around $1.39 trillion, according to U.S. private equity firm
First Reserve.

Large trading companies with good credit can get short-term
revolving loans at rates as low as 1.0-1.5 percentage points
above the London Inter-bank Offered Rate (Libor), the benchmark
based on the rate at which banks lend to each other, according
to Philippe Steiner, vice president of Commodity Trade Invest, a
Swiss-based firm that arranges commodity financing.

The big traders can then lend the money on to other firms at
5 percentage points above Libor, earning a net margin of 3.5-4.0
percent, Steiner said.

“There is an opportunity to use excess liquidity to lend to
smaller traders and pocket the difference,” he told Reuters.

“Receiving money from third parties and then lending it to
other traders in the company’s own name could potentially be
considered as banking activities and be regulated as such.”

One of the difficulties regulators are likely to face is in
determining whether trading houses are lending their own money
or credit borrowed from a third party – which could pass risk on
through the financial system. Many trading companies are
privately owned and do not publish their balance sheets.

Several large traders say openly that they are involved in
some aspects of commodity trade finance.

The world’s third biggest trader in raw materials, Trafigura
- with $40 billion in credit lines as of January – said its
hedge fund Galena launched a trade finance fund in late 2010.

Mercuria, which reported revenues of $98 billion in 2012,
says on its website: “We can provide access to credit and
investment for long- or short-term transactions in oil, coal or
metals…Commodities prepayment facilities and working capital
are available to our customers.”

The companies did not respond to a Reuters request for
comment on their lending activities.

Bruce Tozer, director at advisory firm De Novo Agricultura,
said onerous rules to prevent other financial institutions from
playing the role of banks could be passed on in the form of
higher commodity prices.

“If commodity traders are covered (by shadow banking
regulations), it could have negative implications for liquidity,
because the reason they are doing this (lending) is that some of
the banks can’t,” he said.

“There is a risk that this prevents liquidity getting to the
market by other means, with the potential for higher prices.”

Prosperous, landlocked Switzerland has seen the net influx of workers rise to up to 80,0000 a year, contributing to a house price bubble and prompting criticism from right-wing parties.

The Swiss Federal Council said on Wednesday the quotas, effective for 12 months, will apply to eight central and eastern European countries including Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.

They will likely be extended to a further 17 countries in western and southern Europe in June, it added.

Under the terms of the 1999 Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons, non-EU Switzerland may invoke a “safeguard clause” which allows temporary caps on work permits if the annual influx exceeds a certain number.

” came to the conclusion that the safeguard clause is one of several measures which can help to make immigration more acceptable to society and compatible with its needs,” it said in a statement.

The EU’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said she regretted the Swiss action, adding that it was contrary to the 1999 treaty since the quotas differentiate between countries.

“These measures disregard the great benefits that the free movement of persons brings to the citizens of both Switzerland and the EU,” she said in an emailed statement.

Last April, Switzerland temporarily imposed quotas on workers from the same eight eastern European countries.

(Reporting by Emma Farge; Editing by Michael Roddy)

Trafigura, the third-largest oil trader after Swiss rivals Vitol and Glencore (GLEN.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), has previously not published its profit.

Trafigura, which trades approximately 2.1 million barrels per day of physical oil, reported a rise in its gross profit margin as a percentage of turnover to 2.4 percent from 2.0 percent in the same quarter last year.

Vitol has not published its profit for 2012, although its margin slipped to below 1 percent to a four year low, according to Reuters calculations.

The filing to the Singapore exchange follows Trafigura’s listing of a $500 million perpetual subordinated bond on the bourse earlier this month.

Trading houses have increasingly tapped bond markets to raise capital for investing in physical assets, such as oil refineries and aluminium smelters, to take more control of commodity supply chains.

First Reserve Corp. estimates that since 2002, 75 percent of the roughly $90 billion in capital raised by physical commodity traders has been via public debt offerings.

The Singapore filing showed that Trafigura’s net profit for the first quarter of the 2013 financial year ending September 30. 2013 was $216.1 million compared with $209.5 million the previous year.

Trafigura said its turnover increased by nearly 8 percent over the same period following a rise in oil volumes.

(Reporting by Emma Farge; Editing by Alison Birrane and Louise Heavens)