Deepwater Horizon: BP's former chief executive head of Xstrata

 Ivan Glasenberg two years ago selected Tony Hayward to back the group’s initial public offering: the Glencore chief executive sees the former BP chief executive as one of the best in the oil industry.

. They share a lifestyle that involves near-constant travel. Both had to work hard to climb the corporate ladder..

The personal connection was evident Thursday at the maiden annual meeting of Glencore Xstrata as an enlarged company in Zug, Switzerland, with both men seeming at ease with their respective roles as chief executive and interim chairman.

Yet few expect him to stay in the job for long. Genel, his post-BP vehicle, is his primary focus these days: the company is now the largest independent crude producer in Iraqi Kurdistan.

[May 16]

John Bond, a City veteran and former chairman of Xstrata, earlier surprised investors by announcing he had been voted out of the top job at the miner and trader at its first annual shareholders' meeting, which he then asked Tony Hayward, the former chief executive of BP to lead.

Bond, who had been expected to relinquish his role once a replacement was found, gave no explanation for the vote in Zug, Switzerland, which was presumably backed by Glencore executives who still own almost 25 percent of the company.

As interim chairman, Hayward, already senior independent director, is expected to lead the nominations committee which will pick a permanent replacement. The committee had until Thursday been chaired by Bond.

A new chairman is expected to be appointed by the end of the year, a second source with knowledge of the matter said.

For Hayward, who said he felt "demonized and vilified" over the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, the appointment at Glencore is a return to the top at a major UK-listed resource firm.

[July 25 2010]
Tony Hayward, the embattled chief executive of BP, has agreed to step down and be replaced by Robert Dudley, the company’s most senior American executive who is now in charge of BP’s operations in the Gulf of Mexico, according to a person close to the company’s board.