Barclays Charters VLCC To Store Asian Gasoil -Sources
July 07 2009 - 7:43AM
Dow Jones News
Barclays Capital has chartered a very large crude carrier to
store Asian low-sulfur gasoil off European shores, bringing the
number of supertankers known to be storing gasoil around the world
to five, according to two people with firsthand knowledge of the
transaction.
The VLCC has been loaded with low-sulfur gasoil from Taiwan's
Formosa Petrochemical Corp. (6505.TW), the people said. VLCCs can
typically hold as much as 260,000 metric tons of oil products.
A Barclays Capital spokesman in London declined comment.
The vessel is most likely a newly built ship with no cargo
history and clean tanks, a European shipbroker said, adding that
the vessel will likely travel to Europe for storage off European
shores.
VLCCs typically carry crude oil and don't store clean products
such as gasoil because the tanks have to be cleaned first - a
time-consuming and expensive process.
However, shipowners are charging lower freight rates to place
oil products in floating storage as weak demand for crude makes it
difficult to find jobs for newly built supertankers.
Vitol Holding BV, JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), Gunvor
International BV and Trafigura Group have chartered VLCCs to store
gasoil off European and Middle Eastern shores in the past month as
the premium of forward-month contracts to prompt prices of ICE
gasoil futures makes holding on to stocks worthwhile.
Barclays Capital is a unit of Barclays PLC (BARC.LN).
By Wayne Ma, Dow Jones Newswires; +65 6415 4065;
wayne.ma@dowjones.com