Inside $9bn U.S.-backed critical minerals deal in the DRC

• The U.S., through the Orion Critical Mineral Consortium and Glencore, has secured its first major foothold in DRC’s copper and cobalt mines, directly challenging China’s two-decade vice like grip on critical mineral wealth powering the global green revolution.
• While China built roads, railways and deep political ties through infrastructure-for-resource deals, the U.S. is betting on a different model, that is using government-backed financing and offtake agreements to secure critical minerals without taking on the risks of direct mine ownership.
• Kinshasa is expertly playing both sides, leveraging U.S. interest to squeeze better terms from China, while keeping Chinese investment flowing. The outcome of this high-stakes great game will shape not just DRC‘s future, but the global balance of power in critical minerals for decades.

In the red-dirt hills of Katanga province, where trucks haul copper cathode past Chinese-built roads and Congolese miners descend shafts first dug by colonial-era Belgian prospectors, a new phase in the global scramble for critical minerals is underway. The protagonists this time are not the familiar Chinese state-owned enterprises that have dominated this industry for two decades, but an unlikely alliance: a Swiss mining giant, a U.S. private equity firm, and the full weight of the American foreign policy apparatus.

When Glencore and the Orion Critical Mineral Consortium announced on February 3, 2026, that they had signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding for a $9 billion transaction, the news sent ripples through mining circles from Johannesburg to Beijing.

Under the proposed deal, the U.S.-backed consortium would acquire a 40 percent stake in Glencore’s two flagship Congolese assets, Mutanda Mining (Mumi) and Kamoto Copper Company (KCC), giving Washington a direct foothold in the world’s most strategic mining jurisdiction.

This transaction represents the most significant offensive yet in what has become the central resource competition of our era: the battle between the United States and China for control over the critical minerals stock that will power the 21st-century economy.

Cobalt, copper, lithium, and rare earths are the new oil, essential for electric vehicles, renewable energy infrastructure, advanced weapons systems, and artificial intelligence data centres. And the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) sits atop much of it, supplying more than 70 per cent of the world’s cobalt while ranking among the largest copper producers globally.

For China, which has spent nearly two decades building an unassailable position in Congolese mining through a combination of infrastructure-for-resources deals, patient capital and willingness to operate in high-risk environments, the Orion-Glencore deal is a direct challenge. For the United States, it is a long-overdue attempt to counter Beijing’s dominance using a different playbook, one that relies on financial leverage rather than physical infrastructure, and on partnership with Western miners rather than displacement of them.

Critical Mining in DRC: What Orion CMC is Buying

The transaction at the heart of this story is straightforward in structure but complex in its implications. Orion Critical Mineral Consortium (Orion CMC), established in October 2025 and led by Orion Resource Partners in partnership with the U.S. government, proposes to acquire a 40 per cent interest in Glencore’s holdings at Mutanda Mining and Kamoto Copper Company. The implied combined enterprise value of approximately $9 billion reflects the scale and quality of these assets.

Mutanda is one of the world’s largest cobalt mines, a sprawling open-pit operation that has at times accounted for a fifth of global supply. Kamoto, operated through a joint venture with the Congolese state miner Gécamines, is a major copper and cobalt producer with both open-pit and underground operations. Together, they produced 247,800 tonnes of copper and 33,500 tonnes of cobalt in 2025, enough to make impact in the global markets.

Crucially, under the terms outlined, Glencore would continue to operate both mines as part of its broader group. This is not a fire sale or a retreat from the DRC by the Swiss major. Rather, it is a strategic partnership that allows Glencore to de-risk its position, bring in U.S. government-backed capital and align itself with Washington’s geopolitical objectives while retaining operational control and offtake rights.

Orion CMC, for its part, gains the right to appoint non-executive directors and, more significantly, to “direct the sale of the relevant share of production from the assets to nominated buyers, in accordance with the U.S.-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement, thereby securing critical minerals for the United States and its partners”. In plain English: a substantial portion of the copper and cobalt produced at these mines will flow directly to American buyers, bypassing Chinese-dominated supply chains.

The transaction remains subject to due diligence, definitive agreements, and regulatory approvals. But the political momentum behind it is unmistakable.

The Players: An Unprecedented Public-Private Alliance

What makes this deal remarkable is not its size but its architecture. Orion CMC is not a conventional investment vehicle. It is a “mission-driven consortium” designed to support U.S. strategic objectives in critical minerals access. Its partners include the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), the government’s development finance institution, which brings both capital and diplomatic heft to the table.

DFC CEO Ben Black left little doubt about the stakes involved. “This proposed partnership between Orion CMC and Glencore has the potential to bring significant returns for both the United States and the DRC,” he said in a statement accompanying the announcement.

“Orion CMC’s potential investment would reflect the growing relationship between the U.S. and the DRC, help secure a reliable source of critical minerals for the United States and our partners, and drive economic opportunity and regional stability for the DRC”.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau went further, framing the transaction explicitly in terms of the U.S.-DRC Strategic Partnership Agreement signed in late 2025. The deal, he said, “reflects the core objectives… by encouraging greater U.S. investment in the DRC’s mining sector and promoting secure, reliable, and mutually beneficial flows of critical minerals between our two countries”.

For Glencore, the calculation is both commercial and strategic. CEO Gary Nagle emphasised the company’s unique position as “the only major Western producer of copper and cobalt in the DRC”. By partnering with Orion CMC, Glencore positions itself as the Western mining champion in a jurisdiction increasingly contested by great powers, a role that may afford it political protection and preferential access to U.S. markets and capital.

For Orion Resource Partners, the transaction represents the culmination of a decade of specialised investing in metals and materials critical to the energy transition. Founder and CEO Oskar Lewnowski described it as “exactly what Orion CMC was established to achieve – securing long-life, high-quality production of critical minerals while supporting resilient supply chains for the United States and its allies”.

The Broader U.S. Offensive: Project Vault and the Critical Minerals Strategy

The Glencore-Orion deal is the spear tip of a much broader U.S. government offensive aimed at breaking China’s stranglehold on critical mineral supply chains.

On February 2, 2026, President Donald Trump announced the creation of “Project Vault,” a $12 billion critical minerals strategic reserve. The initiative, funded by $10 billion in loans from the Export-Import Bank and nearly $2 billion in private investment, aims to stockpile minerals deemed essential for national security, including rare earth elements, lithium, cobalt and copper.

By building a strategic reserve, the United States seeks to insulates itself from supply disruptions and price manipulation. But Project Vault is only one pillar of a multi-pronged strategy.

On February 4, the State Department hosted the first Critical Minerals Ministerial, bringing together more than 50 countries including the UK, EU member states, Japan, India, South Korea, Australia, and the DRC. The goal was to forge a “critical minerals trade zone” that excludes China and creates alternative supply chains aligned with Western interests.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer announced that the United States, Japan, and the European Commission are developing “coordinated trade policies and mechanisms” to collectively address vulnerabilities in mineral access.

Meanwhile, Vice President JD Vance signalled that Washington would use tariffs to prevent critical mineral prices from falling too low, a move designed to incentivise investment in new mines by guaranteeing a floor price.

David Copley, a special assistant to President Trump, outlined the scale of ambition, stating that Trump administration intends to “deploy hundreds of billions of capital into the mining sector to get projects going”. Investments have already been made in MP Materials, which operates the only rare earths mine in the United States, and Lithium Americas, a key producer for the battery supply chain.

In the DRC specifically, the U.S. has also launched “Project Vault” as a bilateral initiative aimed at attracting foreign direct investment into the mining sector. Congolese officials have welcomed the move. National Deputy Éric Tshikuma, a member of the ECOFIN committee, described it as an initiative that “will potentially bring significant benefits to the national economy and the Congolese people,” pointing to job creation, infrastructure development, and technology transfer as potential gains.

China’s Entrenched Position in Critical Minerals Industry

To understand what the U.S. is up against, one must examine the scale and depth of China’s presence in the DRC. It is not merely a matter of market share, though that is formidable enough, with Chinese companies controlling more than half of Congolese cobalt production. It is about the structural integration of Chinese capital, Chinese infrastructure, and Chinese political risk tolerance into the very fabric of the Congolese mining economy.

The centrepiece of this presence is the Sicomines joint venture, a partnership between a Chinese consortium comprising China Railway, Sinohydro, and Zhejiang Huayou, and the Congolese state miner Gécamines. Established in 2008 under a landmark minerals-for-infrastructure agreement, Sicomines was designed to develop copper and cobalt deposits in exchange for Chinese-built roads, hospitals and universities.

The scale of Chinese commitment is staggering. According to data compiled by the U.S. research centre AidData, Sicomines contracted nearly $9 billion in debt between 2008 and 2020 to develop its mining operations and finance infrastructure.

This includes loans from Eximbank China carrying interest rates indexed to international markets, as well as shareholder loans from the Chinese consortium itself. Mining revenues must first service this debt before any dividends flow to the Congolese state, a structure that has drawn criticism from transparency advocates but has also funded significant infrastructure development.

The mine reached full capacity in 2024, exporting 246,000 tonnes of copper. Under the terms of the 2024 amendment to the original agreement, Gécamines holds a 32 per cent stake in Sicomines, while the Chinese consortium retains 68 per cent. The amendment also capped royalties paid to Gécamines at 1.2 percent of turnover until all project-related loans are fully repaid, a provision that highlights the extent to which Chinese capital has been willing to accept back-ended returns in exchange for long-term control.

This is the China model in microcosm: patient capital, integrated infrastructure provision, and a willingness to operate in jurisdictions that Western investors have historically avoided.

As risk consultancy Control Risks analyst Roozy noted, Chinese companies “often go deep into resource countries, building supporting infrastructure beyond mining, including transportation and ports”. The result is an ecosystem in which Chinese miners, Chinese contractors, and Chinese logistics providers operate in symbiotic relationship, reducing costs and increasing resilience.

The Contrasting Approaches: Financial Leverage vs. Physical Presence

The Glencore-Orion deal crystallises the fundamental strategic difference between the U.S. and Chinese approaches to securing African minerals. Washington’s model is one of financial leverage; Beijing’s is one of physical presence.

The U.S. strategy, as articulated at the 2026 African Mining Indaba in Cape Town, relies on “financial leverage rather than building physical infrastructure”. Through instruments such as offtake agreements, government-backed financing, and equity stakes in existing mines, the U.S. aims to secure access to minerals without taking on the operational and political risks of direct mine ownership in volatile jurisdictions.

The Glencore-Orion transaction clearly captures this model. Orion gains a 40 per cent stake and offtake rights, but Glencore continues to operate the mines, bearing the day-to-day risks of production in Katanga.

This model has clear advantages. It allows the U.S. to move quickly, leveraging existing production rather than waiting a decade or more for new mines to come online. It insulates Washington from direct responsibility for labour disputes, environmental incidents, or conflicts with local communities. And it aligns naturally with the interests of Western mining majors such as Glencore, which possess operational expertise the U.S. government lacks.

But it also has limitations. As the Chinese state-run media outlet Russian Satellite News Agency observed, “the US attempts to acquire a share of raw materials extracted in Africa through capital injection, and transport them to regions closely tied to the US for processing”. This leaves the processing stage, where the greatest value is added, largely untouched. And processing remains overwhelmingly dominated by China, which controls approximately 90 per cent of global rare earth refining capacity and the majority of cobalt and lithium processing.

The Chinese model, by contrast, is deeply embedded. Chinese companies not only mine African minerals; they build the roads to transport them, the railways to connect mines to ports, and the power stations to run the processing facilities.

Additionally, Chinese firms hire local workers, train local engineers, and cultivate relationships with local politicians. They accept that returns may take years to materialise, and that some investments may fail. This is not altruism; it is a calculated strategy to build structural advantages that are difficult for competitors to replicate.

As the Chinese analysis site Phoenix News noted, “China’s willingness to operate in high-risk regions continues to bring it structural advantages, enabling faster project advancement and earlier output”. The same analysis quoted the journal Modern Diplomacy as suggesting that the Mining Indaba would test “whether the US can break through the limitations of sporadic procurement, or whether China’s deeply entrenched position in Africa’s mining ecosystem will continue to prevail”.

The DRC’s Tightrope: Sovereignty, Revenue and Strategic Ambiguity

For DRC, the intensifying competition between Washington and Beijing presents both opportunity and peril. President Félix Tshisekedi’s government has signalled its intention to extract greater value from the country’s critical mineral wealth while maintaining strategic ambiguity in its great-power relationships.

The creation of Gécamines Trading, a subsidiary responsible for acquiring and marketing minerals from state-backed operations, captures this ambition. As Gécamines Director General Placide Nkala Basadilua put it, the new entity represents “an instrument of sovereignty, transparency and the development of our natural resources for the benefit of the Congolese people”. Through Gécamines Trading, the state can aggregate production from its joint ventures and sell directly to international buyers, capturing more of the value chain and increasing price transparency.

A striking illustration of this approach came in January 2026, when the DRC confirmed plans to ship 100,000 metric tonnes of copper to the United States, sourced from the Tenke Fungurume Mine, which is majority-owned by China’s CMOC Group. The copper, originating from a Chinese-operated mine, will flow to American buyers, demonstrating Kinshasa’s willingness to play both sides against each other.

The Congolese government has also demonstrated its willingness to assert sovereignty in ways that affect Chinese interests. In late 2025, authorities temporarily suspended cobalt exports for four months, a move aimed at consolidating oversight and forcing price appreciation, thereby driving jump in proceeds. The suspension contributed to a 57 per cent rebound in cobalt prices, underscoring the impact of Congolese supply on global markets.

Most significantly, on March 5, 2026, the DRC’s Regulatory Agency for the Monitoring and Coordination of Collaboration Agreements (APCSC) announced the launch of a comprehensive technical and financial audit of the Sicomines program. The audit, to be conducted by a consortium including international law firm Mayer Brown and mining consultancy SRK Consulting, will examine the implementation of the 2008 agreement and its subsequent amendments. It will assess how resources were mobilised, whether contractual commitments were honoured and whether the project has delivered the infrastructure it promised.

The audit’s findings could have profound implications. The 2024 amendment to the Sicomines agreement explicitly made future decisions about the project’s development conditional on the audit results, as well as on full certification of mineral resources and approval of an updated feasibility study. If the audit reveals significant discrepancies between promised and delivered infrastructure, or uncovers evidence of financial mismanagement, it could provide Kinshasa with leverage to renegotiate terms with the Chinese consortium.

This is the tightrope the DRC walks: leveraging U.S. interest to extract better terms from China, while leveraging Chinese investment to maintain leverage over the U.S. Whether Kinshasa can sustain this balancing act without being crushed by the weight of competing great powers is one of the central questions facing the region.

Investment Implications for China

For Beijing, the Glencore-Orion deal and the broader U.S. offensive it represents are unwelcome developments, but not existential threats. China’s position in the DRC and across African mining is too deeply entrenched to be easily dislodged.

At the moment, Chinese companies control more than half of Congolese cobalt production. The Sicomines joint venture alone has contracted nearly $9 billion in debt and reached full production capacity of 246,000 tonnes of copper annually. Chinese-built roads, railways, and ports span the continent, reducing logistics costs and improving the economics of Chinese-controlled mines. Chinese processors refine the vast majority of the world’s cobalt, lithium, and rare earths, meaning that even minerals mined by Western companies often end up passing through Chinese hands.

The U.S. strategy of financial leverage, while clever, does not address this fundamental structural reality. As the Chinese analysis platform The Paper noted, citing experts from the Central Party School and Renmin University, “China-Africa cooperation is still advancing efficiently, stemming from the tangible and rapid development brought to Africa by the Belt and Road Initiative”. The same analysis quoted senior researcher Zhou Rong as saying that “China’s influence in African minerals and economic cooperation is something the US cannot shake in the short term”.

Moreover, the time horizons involved in mining investment favour the incumbent. As the Nikkei Asian Review observed in an analysis republished by The Paper, “from the discovery of a mineral deposit to putting it into operation takes an average of about 16 years”. The U.S. is effectively trying to build, in a few years, a position that China has spent two decades constructing. Even with unlimited political will and financial resources, this is a daunting challenge.

The Paper’s analysis concluded with a sobering assessment from independent critical minerals analyst Chris Berry: “We won’t solve this problem during Trump’s term. This is not something that can be resolved in five years. Re-establishing a system will take more than a decade”.

For China, the immediate response is likely to be threefold. First, Beijing will seek to reassure the Tshisekedi government of its commitment to the relationship, potentially by accelerating infrastructure delivery or offering new investments.

Second, Chinese companies will continue to pursue the strategy of deep integration that has served them well, building the roads and ports that the U.S. financial model neglects. Third, Beijing will use its diplomatic leverage, both in Kinshasa and in multilateral forums, to push back against what it may characterise as U.S. efforts to “decouple” global supply chains in ways that harm developing countries.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry’s response to the February Critical Minerals Ministerial was measured but pointed. A spokesperson said that “countries need to follow the principles of market economy and international economic and trade rules, step up communication and dialogue”, a subtle suggestion that the U.S. approach risked politicising what should be commercial decisions.

The View from the Ground: Can the U.S. Deliver?

For all the strategic logic of the Glencore-Orion deal and the broader U.S. offensive, significant questions remain about implementation. The history of U.S. engagement with African mining is littered with grand announcements and limited follow-through.

Moroccan media, commenting on U.S. investment overtures, warned that Washington’s previous commitments in Africa suffered from “more announcements than implementation” and urged local partners to insist on clear timelines for technology transfer and investment delivery.

For decades, statistics show that U.S. development finance institutions move slowly, private capital is risk-averse, and the U.S. government lacks the deep bench of mining expertise that Chinese state-owned enterprises have accumulated over the years.

Even within the U.S. strategy, tensions exist. Project Vault’s $12 billion reserve, while substantial, would cover only about 45 days of demand for the 44 critical minerals it targets, according to Wood Mackenzie analysis. And by publicly announcing its budget and plans, the U.S. government may have undermined its negotiating position. As Wood Mackenzie analyst James Willoughby put it, “The government has essentially shown its hand. Suppliers now have more leverage, which could drive up procurement costs”.

The Glencore-Orion deal itself remains non-binding and subject to multiple conditions. Due diligence on complex mining assets in a challenging jurisdiction will take time. Regulatory approvals, including from Congolese authorities who may seek to extract maximum advantage from the competition between Washington and Beijing, are not guaranteed. And the transaction must navigate the complexities of Glencore’s own corporate structure, including ongoing speculation about a potential acquisition by Rio Tinto.

Yet there are reasons for cautious optimism. The U.S. approach has evolved significantly from earlier, more naive interventions. By partnering with Glencore, an operator with decades of experience in the DRC, Orion CMC gains instant credibility and operational capability.

Additionally, by focusing on offtake rights rather than operational control, the consortium limits its exposure to the political and social risks that have burned so many foreign investors in Katanga. And by assembling a coalition of like-minded countries through the Critical Minerals Ministerial, Washington is building the kind of multilateral architecture that can outlast any single administration.

A New Phase in Power Competition for Africa’s Mineral Wealth

The $9 billion Glencore-Orion deal marks the beginning of a new phase in the great power competition for Africa’s mineral wealth, not its end. For the first time in two decades, the United States has assembled the financial resources, the private sector partnerships, and the diplomatic will to challenge China’s dominance in a meaningful way.

The contest that follows will be decided not by any single transaction, but by which model proves more durable and more attractive to African partners. China offers infrastructure, speed, and a willingness to operate in high-risk environments. The U.S. offers financial leverage, alignment with Western supply chains, and the potential for premium pricing through mechanisms like tariff-backed price floors. Both models have strengths and weaknesses.

For DRC, the intensifying competition creates unprecedented leverage. Kinshasa can now credibly threaten to redirect minerals to American buyers if Chinese partners fail to deliver on infrastructure promises, while also signaling to Washington that Chinese investment remains an attractive alternative if U.S. commitments prove hollow. The challenge for Congolese leaders will be to translate this leverage into tangible benefits for their people, jobs, infrastructure, and revenue that funds development rather than corruption.

For China, the U.S. offensive is a wake-up call. The position Beijing has built in the DRC and across African mining is formidable, but it is not impregnable. If Chinese companies become complacent, if infrastructure delivery slows, if relationships with local communities fray, the opening the U.S. seeks will grow wider. The response from Beijing will likely be to deepen its engagement, accelerating investment in processing capacity and infrastructure while working to address the transparency concerns that have long dogged Chinese mining projects.

For the United States, the Glencore-Orion deal is a promising start, but only a start. The financial leverage model must prove it can deliver not just offtake agreements but actual minerals to American shores, at competitive prices, without triggering political backlash in the DRC or trade retaliation from China.

It must demonstrate that it can attract sufficient private capital to scale beyond a few headline transactions. And it must show that the coalition of like-minded countries assembled at the February ministerial can cohere into a genuine alternative to Chinese-dominated supply chains.

The next five years will be decisive for DRC. If the U.S. can build on the Glencore-Orion transaction to create a self-sustaining ecosystem of Western investment in African mining, the balance of power in critical minerals could shift significantly. If not, China’s deep entrenchment will likely prove insurmountable, and the DRC’s cobalt and copper will continue to flow predominantly eastward.

For now, the red-dirt hills of Katanga remain contested territory. The trucks still haul their loads past Chinese-built roads and Congolese villages. But the flags flying over the mines are no longer solely those of Beijing. For the first time in a generation, the stars and stripes is again in the picture, and the great game for Africa’s minerals has entered a new and more unpredictable phase.

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