Poten & Partners has tallied the numbers for dirty spot charters last year with a familiar name at the top of the leaderboard and a notable leap from Trafigura into the top 10 league.
China’s Unipec, which has dominated dirty spot chartering for most of the past decade, remains tanker shipping’s dominant name, fixing more ships than second and third placed Shell and Vitol combined. Geneva-based commodities firm Trafigura saw the greatest leap up the ranks, going from 17th to 10th spot.
“Because China was less impacted by Covid-19 than Europe and the Americas, Unipec strengthened its position on top of the leader board (despite a lower fixture count). In 2020, they controlled 18% of total dirty spot cargoes, versus 17% in 2019. Overall, spot market activity was down 16% due to Covid-19,” tanker broker Poten noted in its most recent weekly report.
