Glencore is often considered one of the smartest players in the resources arena and its listed investments in Australian resources live up to the hype.

The secretive commodity trading house’s biggest investment and joint venture partner in Australia, nickel producer Minara Resources , is up about 8 per cent for the financial year, although the stock has fallen hard since January, when it traded as high as 97¢. On Thursday the stock slipped about 2.7 per cent after the company said a partial failure of a heat exchanger had forced it to shut an acid plant. Production has been curtailed while the plant is shut and the company tries to asses the impact.