November 29, 2010 [Dow Jones Newswires] - Mercuria Energy Group has chartered a newly built Suezmax oil tanker, likely to transport high-sulfur gasoil from Singapore, a person familiar with the matter said Monday.
The Switzerland-based trading company has been in the spotlight since it bought 20 high-sulfur gasoil cargoes totaling almost 4 million barrels in Singapore’s spot market for November and December.
In coming weeks, Mercuria may charter more oil tankers to handle the volume of gasoil it has purchased in Singapore, since it is unlikely to store it in the city-state.
A spokesman for Mercuria in Switzerland said Monday the company never comments on day-to-day operational issues.
Mercuria chartered the newly built Suezmax vessel Princimar Joy, the person said, adding that it won’t be used as a floating storage vessel. The ship was last seen waiting for orders off Singapore on Nov. 25, according to publicly available vessel tracking data. It has a capacity of 130,000 metric tons, or almost 1 million barrels of gasoil, shipbrokers said.
It isn’t known where Mercuria will take the rest of its gasoil. The company leases about 50,000 cubic meters, or about 300,000 barrels, of gasoil storage at Vopak NV’s terminal in Banyan, Singapore and about 150,000 cubic meters of storage at Oiltanking Ltd.’s terminal in Merak, Indonesia.
