An investment company with ties to Hunter Biden helped a Chinese conglomerate secure one of the largest cobalt mines in the world from a US company, The New York Times reported on Saturday.
The Tenke Fungurume mine, located in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was reportedly sold in 2016 by American company Freeport-McMoRan to China Molybdenum for $2.65 billion.
China Molybdenum's partner, Bohai Harvest RST Equity Investment Fund Management Company (BHR, registered in Shanghai) was founded in 2013 by Hunter Biden and two other Americans and some Chinese partners. Three US citizens were on the board of directors and controlled 30 percent of the mine.
BHR held a minority stake in Tenke Fungurume and reportedly agreed with China Molybdenum before the purchase that the latter would buy BHR’s portion. China Molybdenum did so two years later and its Tenke Fungurume share increased to 80 percent.
By this time, Hunter Biden reportedly controlled 10 percent of BHR through his Skaneateles company, headquartered in Washington. A former BHR board member told the newspaper that Biden, like other Americans in the board, wasn’t involved in the deal. Biden's lawyer said his client had no ties to Skaneateles.
"He has been working to unwind his investment, but I would certainly point you — he’s a private citizen," Jen Psaki said at that time. "I would point you to him or his lawyers on the outside on any update."
According to Fox News, Chinese business documents show that Biden continues to own a 10 percent stake of BHR through Skaneateles LLC.
Meanwhile, Hunter Biden announced his departure from BHR in October 2019 soon after his business activity in China came under scrutiny amid allegations that he was assisted by his father, Joe Biden. According to The New York Post, “Hunter Biden introduced his father to Chinese private equity executive Jonathan Li during the trip. Li later became the CEO of BHR” in 2019.
Then Hunter Biden promised that he would not participate in the management of foreign companies if his father won the 2020 presidential election.
Cobalt and Supply Chain Crisis
The alleged deal has gained attention amid Washington's concerns about the threat of China's growing dominance in the cobalt market. Washington fears that Beijing could use its position to prevent the US from re-equipping its auto industry to produce electric vehicles.
Cobalt is a by-product of copper and nickel mining, with over 60 percent of the world's annual cobalt production (130,000 tonnes) coming from the DRC, one of the poorest countries in Africa.
Meanwhile, Chinese companies already control about 40 percent of production in the DRC, and have also signed long-term supply agreements with Glencore, the only major Western producer operating in the country.
China also dominates cobalt processing and invests in mines. Earlier this year, the $130 billion Chinese battery manufacturer CATL paid $137 million for a 25 percent stake in China Molybdenum's Kisanfu copper-cobalt mine.
Ivan Glazenberg, CEO of Glencore, the world’s biggest producer of cobalt, noted earlier that the American and European auto industries risk falling behind their Chinese competitors if they cannot secure supplies of cobalt. According to him, Chinese companies have quickly realized the vulnerability of supply chains.
“The western companies have not done it. They either don’t believe this is an issue or they believe they are definitely going to get the batteries from China,” Glasenberg said. “But what happens if that doesn’t occur and the Chinese say we are not going to export batteries, we are going to export electric vehicles. Where are the batteries going to come from?”