Singapore
Key oil freight rates from the Middle East to Asia rocketed as much as 28 percent on in a global oil shipping market spooked by US sanctions on units of Chinese giant COSCO for alleged involvement in ferrying crude out of Iran. In what the State Department called “one of the largest sanctions actions the US has taken” since curbs were re-imposed on Iran in November last year, two units of COSCO were named alongside other companies in claims of involvement in sanctions-busting shipments of Iranian oil. The surprise move, affecting one of the world’s largest energy shippers, operating more than 50 supertankers, comes as President Donald Trump seeks to exert maximum pressure on Iran to drop nuclear programs. As some Asian oil buyers rushed to the shipping market to secure vessels, rates for chartering supertankers, or Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs), to load crude oil from the Middle East to north Asia in October surged nearly 19 percent overnight to about 75-76 points on Worldscale, an industry tool used to calculate freight charges, shipping and industry sources said. That means an increase of about $600,000 for each ship, a Singapore-based crude oil trader said. The rates for loading Middle East crude to west coast India in the second week of October jumped 28 percent to 80-92.5 points after Reliance Industries Ltd. booked two supertankers overnight, industry sources said. But there was also uncertainty over how widely the sanctions on the COSCO units — COSCO Shipping Tanker (Dalian) Co, Ltd. and its subsidiary COSCO Shipping Tanker (Dalian) Seaman & Ship Management — will be implemented. Industry sources said some oil buyers were holding off hiring COSCO tankers while they check with legal teams to better understand the impact of the sanctions.—Arab News
