Congo sends first copper shipment to US market via Mercuria

The Democratic Republic of Congo has dispatched its first copper shipment to the United States through an arrangement with commodities trader Mercuria Energy Group, as Washington seeks to reduce Chinese control over critical mineral supplies.

State-owned Gécamines said it would deliver 100,000 tonnes of copper drawn from its 20% interest in CMOC Group's Tenke Fungurume operation. Gécamines Trading is acquiring the metal from Tenke's 2026 production and marketing it to American buyers under a strategic accord struck with Washington in January.

A pivot with limits

The DRC, the world's second-largest copper producer and holder of the largest cobalt reserves, has granted the US access to mining and infrastructure ventures in return for support against a Rwanda-backed insurgency in the country's east. Chinese enterprises, including CMOC, currently control the bulk of Congolese copper and cobalt extraction and refining, meaning the US arrangement works within, rather than around, existing Chinese-operated mines. Mercuria, which first disclosed the collaboration the previous October, has been rapidly expanding its metals business under Kostas Bintas, previously co-head of metals at rival Trafigura Group.

Why it matters

The shipment marked Gécamines' clearest step yet towards converting its passive minority stakes in Chinese- and Swiss-operated mines into an active trading business capable of directing physical metal to buyers of its choosing. For Washington, it offered proof of concept that a US-DRC minerals partnership could yield actual tonnes rather than just diplomatic goodwill, even without displacing the Chinese companies that operate the mines. The initial 100,000-tonne commitment was modest next to the DRC's total annual copper exports, but it set a precedent that Gécamines would expand rapidly over the following months, first doubling its trading ambitions and then, within a year, lifting its planned US-bound volumes fivefold. It also gave the Trump administration a tangible early result to point to from its critical-minerals diplomacy with Kinshasa, at a time when much of that diplomacy remained focused on security guarantees rather than physical trade flows.

Sources

• Miningmx: Congo directs first copper shipment to US market, 13 Jan 2026

Photo: Loading of copper-cobalt ore for processing at a mine in the DRC's Katanga copperbelt. Gécamines (Zairian company), Wikimedia Commons, Public domain.