War is hell. Unless you’re a commodity trading house with a fleet of tankers and a tolerance for risk, in which case it’s apparently a record-setting first half.
The Iran war that began in late February has turned into a profit engine for the world’s biggest independent commodity traders, with firms like Trafigura, Glencore, and Vitol posting earnings that would make most Fortune 500 CEOs blush. The conflict choked off tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, disrupting roughly one-fifth of global oil supply and creating exactly the kind of price dislocations that trading desks are built to exploit.
The numbers tell the story
Trafigura’s first-half 2026 net profit hit $4.1B, more than double what the firm earned during the same period last year. The Geneva-based giant paid out a record dividend of $3.05B to its roughly 1,400 employee-owners. Quick math: that’s an average of about $2.2 million per person, though the actual distribution skews heavily toward senior partners.
Glencore’s energy trading division might have posted the most jaw-dropping swing of all. Adjusted EBIT came in at $2.66B for the first half. The same division earned $40 million a year earlier. That’s not a modest improvement. That’s a 6,550% increase.
