Billed as one of the world’s biggest share floats the Glencore bandwagon spent part of last week warming up in Hong Kong, where it won stock exchange approval for a secondary listing.

The primary listing will be in London where a gathering of financiers, stockbrokers and investment bankers are deciding how best to market the $US10 billion capital raising which will convert a secretive commodity dealer into a publicly listed vehicle.

Once floated, Glencore will have a market value of close to $US60 billion with the bulk of the equity still in the hands of the 400 partners.

For those partners, who are possibly the smartest guys in the mining business, this is an event which will make them astonishingly rich. It is a pay day with bells and whistles attached, with everyone getting a multi-million dollar cheque for a slice of their equity, some getting tens of millions of dollars in cash – while retaining shares valued in the billions of dollars.

This is the second time in four weeks that Dryblower has taken a squiz at the looming Glencore float, and he offers no apologies for re-visiting the scene because this is an event which will change the structure of the global mining industry.

In theory, it represents the creation of a stock exchange-listed business to rival the sector leaders and one which, should it merge with its earlier creation, Xstrata, will have the firepower to acquire the sector leaders we know, including Rio Tinto and Anglo American.

It is when you look at the Glencore float in that light that everyone in mining ought to sit up and take notice of a truly game changing event.

But, what of that question last addressed here on March 7 when Dryblower took a very negative view of the float, telling prospective investors to avoid the offer. Well, that might still be the best advice because the question remains “why now?”

The only answer is that Glencore management believes the time is right. That now is precisely when they will get the maximum possible price because high commodity prices have put a premium on the float.

See the problem? If the Glencore guys really are the smartest in the room, why are they selling? What can they see of the future that buyers cannot?

The nasty answer, and why Dryblower continues to fret about it, is that Glencore’s owners reckon we are at a price-peak, a time when smart sellers head for the exits taking their profits with them.

It is hard to not see something of that thinking behind the Glencore float, and in time we might see the April/May period of 2011 as the pinnacle of this commodity boom – in which case we have all been warned.

But, last week a more positive way of looking at the float emerged and that came with news that thermal coal prices have hit an all-time high, and that iron ore prices have begun creeping up again as the commodity boom got a fresh boost from seemingly unstoppable demand for raw materials in Asia.

This is the “end of the beginning” argument, the one which swings on the “capital marshalling” argument and that Glencore (possibly with the aid of Xstrata) is positioning itself to be the top dog in the global mining sector – not just the top commodity trader.

A freshly-floated Glencore/Xstrata will not just have unequalled capacity to buy and sell commodities, it will have the financial muscle to buy and sell entire companies – and influence the behaviour of countries.

Conspiracy theorists will have a field day as “New Glencore” emerges as a business built on smart commodity trading, but morphing into one with the capital-raising capacity that comes with a stock exchange listing, and a Swiss domicile which comes with ultra-low tax rates.

New Glencore will be more than a new boy on the block. It will be a gorilla in the room poised to do deals on a grand scale, and while that might appear alarming it is also a vote of confidence in the future of the commodities boom.

Rather than cashing out, which some long-term Glencore workers will do, it is possible that the float is a way of cashing up in readiness for better times ahead.

Disclaimer: Neither International Longwall News nor the writer imply any investment recommendation regarding any stock mentioned and comments herein are speculative in nature. Investors should consult their professional financial advisers.

*Dryblower is a weekly column on ILN’s sister publication MiningNews.net.