Daniel Flynn News

When the supertanker Young Yong sailed to the Chinese port of Qingdao in September last year, it had quality certificates for its cargo stating it was transporting Malaysian crude oil, according to the documents reviewed by Reuters.But satellite images and photos show the Chinese-owned ship had loaded the oil four months earlier in Venezuela, an OPEC nation in South America under U.S. oil sanctions.The Young Yong is one of three vessels identified by Reuters that were chartered by little-known companies to export Venezuelan oil and used false documents to conceal its origin, according to shipping documents and 11 sources with knowledge of the trade.Two of those tankers, including the Young Yong, were designated this month by U.S.

More than a dozen large tankers were waiting on Wednesday at Venezuela's main oil port and nearby anchorage zones for state-run PDVSA to assign them slots to load crude, as an outage and low inventories caused delays, according to documents and sources.Venezuela's crude output declined in April to 445,000 barrels per day (bpd), according to secondary sources consulted by OPEC, down 81,000 bpd from March levels. The drop was mainly due to a lack of diluents to produce exportable grades from the country's largest oil region…

Three Cuban-flagged tankers that are under U.S. sanctions for transporting Venezuelan oil to the Communist-run island have been serviced in the port of Veracruz on Mexico's Gulf coast, according to vessel tracking data and industry sources.The maintenance work on the vessels—one of which was serviced as recently as this month—is a potential breach of sanctions on Venezuela, two lawyers who specialize in U.S. sanctions said.However, the United States has in the past not brought enforcement actions against shipyards for doing work on blacklisted vessels from those countries, according to U.S. Treasury Department data.Under U.S. law, companies and individuals are prohibited from materially assisting sanctioned entities.

The first cargo from new oil producer Guyana to the world's third-largest crude importer, India, departed this month from a production facility off the South American nation's coast in a vessel chartered by trading firm Trafigura, data from Refinitiv Eikon showed on Tuesday.India has asked refiners to speed up the diversification of imports to cut their dependence on Middle Eastern crudes after OPEC+ this month decided to extend production cuts through April, two sources said.As OPEC's share in India's oil imports fell to historic lows between April 2020 and January 2021…

Venezuela is shipping jet fuel to Iran in return for vital gasoline imports for the South American nation as part of a swap deal agreed by the two state-run oil firms, three people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.Iran has ramped up assistance to Venezuela since last year as the United States tightened sanctions on both countries, hitting oil exports by state-run firms Petroleos de Venezuela and National Iranian oil Company (NIOC).Iran has sent flotillas of state-operated tankers carrying gasoline and feedstock for motor fuel to Venezuela, as well as equipment and spare parts to help the once-prosperous OPEC nation restart its…

A tanker chartered by the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) is loading Venezuelan crude for export, documents from state-run PDVSA show, providing evidence of the two countries’ latest tactics to expand their trade in defiance of U.S. sanctions.Venezuela and Iran have deepened their cooperation this year as Venezuela has exchanged gold and other commodities for Iranian food, condensate and fuel.Names of scrapped vessels are being used by several PDVSA (Petroleos de Venezuela, S.A.) customers, including NIOC, to disguise the routes and identities of the tankers they use.A very large crude carrier (VLCC), identified in PDVSA’s loading documents as the Ndros…

Venezuela has resumed direct shipments of oil to China after U.S. sanctions sent the trade underground for more than a year, according to Refinitiv Eikon vessel-tracking data and internal documents from state company Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA).Chinese state companies China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) and PetroChina - long among PDVSA's top customers - stopped loading crude and fuel at Venezuelan ports in August 2019 after Washington extended its sanctions on PDVSA to include any companies trading with the Venezuelan state firm.The imposition of the sanctions was part of a push by the Trump administration to oust Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro…

On Aug. 21, a tanker called the Otoman docked at the Jose oil terminal on Venezuela’s coast in the Caribbean to load 1.82 million barrels of heavy crude, according to the state oil company’s internal documents.Yet no tanker with that name is registered in major global shipping databases.Muddying the situation further, the unique identifier for the Otoman listed in the documents - a number used by the International Maritime Organization to identify ships - was assigned to another tanker called the Rubyni, according to the databases.The Rubyni was broken up two years ago, they record. Satellite images provided by TankerTrackers.com, an independent vessel tracking service…

Venezuela's oil exports fell to a historic low of 359,000 barrels per day (bpd) in October as most of state-run PDVSA's long-term clients paused trade to meet a U.S. deadline to halt business with the firm, according to data seen by Reuters on Monday.The United States set an October-November deadline for PDVSA's long-term customers - including Italy Eni, Spain's Repsol and India's Reliance Industries - to stop oil swaps it had authorized this year as exceptions to sanctions on Venezuela.None of those companies loaded cargoes of Venezuelan crude in October…

Two Venezuela-owned oil tankers are crossing the Atlantic Ocean jointly carrying about 1.2 million barrels of heavy crude, vessel tracking data from Refinitiv Eikon showed on Tuesday, as the South American nation turns to its own fleet in the face of U.S. sanctions.Venezuela's state-run oil company PDVSA is resorting to using its own tankers to deliver exports as tightening sanctions by Washington deter shipowners and managers from visiting the South American nation's oil ports.The tankers Colon—previously known as Arita—and Parnaso set sail in September from PDVSA's terminals, but had not turned their location transponders on until this week…

Venezuela's state-run oil firm PDVSA is informing customers about a new hub for doing ship-to-ship transfers for exports in a location away from shore, a shift that could mean higher costs and less supervision, according to three sources.More than two-thirds of Venezuela's oil exports leave from the Jose terminal on the country's eastern coast, a large and heavily supervised facility with two monobuoys for exports and connected through pipelines to several crude upgraders.But with U.S.

The first of a group of three tankers carrying Iranian fuel for gasoline-starved Venezuela entered the waters of the South American nation on Monday, according to Refinitiv Eikon data, in the most recent sign of the countries' expanding trade.The two OPEC members have increased cooperation this year by exchanging crude, fuel, food, equipment for refineries and other industrial goods. Many details about the transactions are not available, however.The Iran-flagged tanker Forest, transporting some 270,000 barrels of fuel loaded in the Middle East, entered Venezuela's exclusive economic zone around 8:05 a.m. local time (1205 GMT) without any disturbances…

Venezuela's state-run PDVSA and Eni are looking at options to safely offload crude from a floating storage facility on Venezuela's eastern coast that has remained idle for over a year due to U.S. sanctions, according to sources close to the discussions and a statement from the Italian oil company.The companies suspended output at their joint venture Petrosucre shortly after Washington imposed sanctions on PDVSA in January 2019, depriving the partnership of its main crude buyer, PDVSA's U.S.-based refining subsidiary Citgo Petroleum.About 1.3 million barrels of Corocoro crude stored at the FSO (floating storage and offloading facility) have remained stuck in the vessel…

The United States is considering an October deadline for ending exemptions to Venezuelan sanctions that allow some companies and refiners to still receive the South American producer's oil, two sources said, as Washington seeks to raise the heat on President Nicolas Maduro.U.S. President Donald Trump has ramped up sanctions on Venezuela's state-run PDVSA, its key foreign partners and customers since it first imposed measures against the company in early 2019, seeking to oust the…

Three large crude carriers (VLCCs) chartered by units of Russian oil major Rosneft to transport Venezuelan oil left Caribbean waters empty on Saturday after the cargoes were canceled due to sanctions, according to Refinitiv Eikon data and a document from Venezuelan state-run oil firm PDVSA.The vessels - which would jointly export some 5.7 million barrels of Venezuelan heavy crude to Asia - had waited for weeks near Venezuelan waters to load, but the cargoes were canceled this week due to sanctions on PDVSA and Rosneft's trading units…

A shipping joint venture between Venezuela and China has fallen apart in the wake of U.S. sanctions, resulting in the South American nation losing three supertankers at a time when foreign shippers are reluctant to carry its oil, court documents show.PetroChina Co Ltd, which had been state-run Petroleos de Venezuela’s partner in the Singapore-based joint venture CV Shipping Pte Ltd, took control of the three tankers between January and February, according the documents from a Singapore court reviewed by Reuters.The transfer of the Junin, Boyaca and Carabobo very large crude carriers (VLCC) has not been previously reported.It came after U.S.

A Brazilian federal court on Thursday ordered the suspension of activities at Vale SA's Port of Tubarão because of pollution concerns, halting the world's largest iron ore exporter's ability to ship more than a third of its output. The ruling by the court in Vitoria was made as part of a police investigation at the giant man-made port as Vale comes under increasing pressure over its environmental record in Brazil after a dam burst at a mine run by its Samarco joint venture in October, killing at least 17 people.

Petroleo Brasileiro SA's chief executive quit on Friday in a surprise move that wiped $12 billion off the state-controlled oil producer's market valuation, after Brazil's government responded to a national trucking strike by intervening in the company's fuel pricing policy.Pedro Parente, who in two years in the job had succeeded in slashing the scandal-plagued company's debt and restoring it to profitability, said in a resignation letter to President Michel Temer it was clear after the last week's turmoil that new talks would be needed on pricing policy."Given this situation…

Ghana's finance minister said on Thursday that the forecast for oil revenues in 2015 had been slashed to 1.5 billion cedis ($416.7 million), down from 4.2 billion cedis forecast in the budget presented in November due to falling oil prices.   Finance Minister Seth Terkper told parliament the government had based its original revenue forecast on oil prices averaging $99.4 per barrel this year but was now using an IMF projection of oil at $52.8 per barrel.   Terkper also said that the oil production forecast for 2015 remained unchanged at 102,033 barrels per day.     ($1=3.60 cedis) (Reporting by Kwasi Kpodo; Writing by David Lewis; Editing by Daniel Flynn)

A consortium led by France's Bollore failed to make the final shortlist of firms vying to manage a new container terminal in Cameroon's southern port of Kribi, according to a commission report seen by Reuters on Monday. The government commission, charged with recommending a container terminal manager, shortlisted Philippines-based ICTSI and port operator APM Terminals, a unit of shipping and oil conglomerate A.P. Moller-Maersk. The commission said in its report it had reservations over the sustainability of the proposal from Bollore's consortium and found the offers from ICTSI and APMT to be the most plausible. "The Commission accepted the offers of ICTSI and APMT as being the most advantageous for Cameroon and the central African sub-region," it said.

Chevron plans to sign a 5-year agreement to lease berthing space for its vessels from U.S. oil service company Edison Chouest Offshore, Chouest's head of Brazilian operations said on Tuesday.   Chouest's 950-million-real ($275 million) base is located at Prumo Logistica's Port of Acu, on the northeast coast of Rio de Janeiro state. It is scheduled to be completed by mid-2017, Chouest's Brazilian head Ricardo Chagas told reporters. ($1 = 3.4485 Brazilian reais) (Reporting by Jeb Blount; Writing by Reese Ewing; Editing by Daniel Flynn)

Major cocoa buyers are boycotting a scheme in Ivory Coast aimed at guaranteeing local firms a share of the lucrative export market, arguing that these players lack the expertise and financing to ensure reliable deliveries. A 2011 reform of the cocoa sector in Ivory Coast, the world's largest producer, specified that a significant share of the annual crop should be allocated to local companies for export, in a bid to develop the domestic industry. This season, the Coffee and Cocoa Council (CCC) regulator awarded contracts to local exporters for the delivery of 150,000 tonnes of cocoa, from an estimated total crop of 1.7 million tonnes. The CCC uses a messaging system to pair up international firms seeking cocoa with local exporters who handle the shipment.

Brazil may allow companies besides Petrobras to bid for the right to produce extra oil from areas it sold to the state-led oil company in 2010, the head of the exploration and production policy at the energy ministry, Jose Botelho, said on Wednesday.   Botelho also said the government may allow Petroleo Brasileiro SA, as Petrobras is formally known, to pay with oil for adjustments in the price of the maximum 5 billion barrels of oil and equivalent natural gas it is allowed to produce in the areas.     (Reporting by Marta Nogueira, writing by Jeb Blount; Editing by Daniel Flynn)