FOR all that the Trump trade disruption is upsetting markets, there are some silver linings. And tanker owners may have found one.

John Fredriksen’s Frontline reports that tightening Ofac, EU and UK sanctions are giving compliant crude carriers cause for hope.

Chief executive Lars Barstad said the share of sanctioned barrels on the market had grown since Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022.

But increasing production from Opec and Latin America “has given the markets headroom to choose compliant sources of oil without affecting oil prices materially”.

“We seem to have found a limit on production and export growth from the sanctioned nations,” Barstad said.

India, fearful of more tariff retribution from Uncle Sam, is now scrambling to replace Russian volumes with the compliant kind, pushing up Middle East prices.

This has continued, according to the cheerful Barstad, to a point where exports headed east from the Atlantic Basin can compete with those from the Middle East.

That means longer voyages, of which tanker owners very much approve.

This is yet another example of how market forces, not political statements, make the world go round.

But when those statements come from Trump, countries sit up and take note.

We wish, of course, that markets and regulation were more predictable. But tanker owners will take the fruits of disruption when they can.

Declan Bush
Senior reporter, Lloyd’s List

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