EU Commission eyes 'Glenstrata' deal, says Telegraph

LONDON (ShareCast) - Glencore may face a regulatory hurdle in its attempted merger with fellow FTSE 100 (Euronext: VFTSE.NX - news) commodity company Xstrata (Dusseldorf: XTR.DU - news) , reports the Daily Telegraph The paper claims the European Union's competition Commissioner, Joaquin Almunia, may look into the transaction, although provides no sources for the story. Because Glencore already has a 34% stake in Xstrata the EU had previously said it viewed the two companies as a single entity, thus removing the need for a competition investigation. That ruling, however, was made in 2006 before Almunia took up his current brief. Glencore shares have dropped 3.5% this morning. BS