Glencore is hit by bribery verdict in Belgium

If yesterday wasn't already eventful enough for Glencore, a Belgian court convicted a subsidiary of the commodities trader of bribing a European Union official in return for sensitive market information. In the ruling, Judge Pierre Hendrickx found subsidiary company Glencore Grain Rotterdam guilty of paying the mobile phone bills and laying on a French holiday to secure information about grain subsidies.

He fined the unit €500,000 (£400,000). Meanwhile, Karel Brus, a former EU Agriculture Department official, was sentenced to 40 months in jail. Mr Brus accepted a holiday to the south of France in 2003, while Glencore also paid €20,000 worth of phone bills for him in 2002 and 2003.

A Glencore spokesman said: "We are considering our position".