The Paris Commercial Court validated, on Wednesday July 6, the partial sale of the industrial activities of Recylex to the Belgian Campine NV for 4 million euros. This is less than 10% of the debt of the metal recycling company, mainly due to the Swiss Glencore. This decision follows Recylex’s receivership in May. The takeover by the Belgian group of the lead battery recycling sites of Escaudoeuvres (Nord), Villefranche-sur-Saône (Rhône) and their sixty employees is accompanied by the transfer to Campine NV of the participation of Recylex in the company C2P (recycling of plastics and polypropylenes), also based in Villefranche-sur-Saône.
Metaleurop, whose name remains linked to the industrial history of northern France, became Recylex in 2007. It was four years after the particularly brutal closure of the oldest lead foundry in Europe, created in 1894 in Noyelles -Godault, in the Pas-de-Calais mining area. It only took seven years for Glencore, one of the world’s leading metal traders, to empty Metaleurop Nord of its substance, of which it had become the main shareholder via Metaleurop SA, its parent company. In January 2003, it was by a lapidary fax that she caused astonishment by announcing the closure, overnight, of the northern foundry. It abandoned 830 employees to their fate without severance pay. Jacques Chirac, then President of the Republic, had denounced “rogue boss methods”. Metaleurop also left irreversible pollution of the soil with lead and cadmium.
Listed on Euronext Paris – its course was suspended in 2020 – Recylex is 29.76% owned by Glencore Finance Ltd, a company from the Glencore galaxy, registered in Bermuda. The near sole customer for its lead business is Nordenham Metall GmbH, a subsidiary of Glencore International AG. Recylex is indebted to the tune of 68.4 million euros, including provisions for environmental risks and liabilities. In this debt, we find in particular Glencore International AG for a loan of 18.2 million euros (with capitalized interest), a return to better fortune clause whose main creditor is still Glencore (3.5 million euros ), and a €25.6 million cartel fine imposed by the European Commission.
Endless legal proceedings
Finally, there are the 5.7 million granted to SNCF Réseau by the administrative court of Marseille in June 2021 for the restoration of the public railway domain around the former industrial site of L’Estaque (and this, up to €63.3 million as and when calls for funds from SNCF Réseau). Recylex appealed this decision. Two years ago, Recylex announced the loss of control of its German sub-group, made up of four entities declared insolvent. They were taken over by Glencore in April 2021 via Nordenham Metall GmbH (the current main creditor of Recylex’s lead business). It is still Glencore which, at the time, granted a loan of 16 million euros to this German sub-group.
You have 26.76% of this article left to read. The following is for subscribers only.