Service providers and job seekers are increasingly falling prey to scammers requesting cash upfront for securing COVID19 related tenders and general employment, warns Transnet Port Terminals (TPT). While social media platforms have previously been used throughout the year to advertise false opportunities, the intensity this year is at an all-time high. According to Mbali Mathenjwa, TPT Corporate Affairs Executive Manager, “We will keep appealing to members of the public not to part with their hard earned cash. No legitimate Transnet opportunity will ever require cash upfront”. She added that verifying ...

Taiwan’s Formosa Petrochemical will not have any gasoline sales contract on a term basis in the first quarter of 2021, as the producer is unlikely to have much gasoline for export during that period, a company source said Nov. 25. “This year, we had the RDS [residue desulfurization unit] outage. Before the RDS restarts next year, our gasoline export volume will be low,” the source said. Formosa expects to restart its fire-hit No. 2 RDS unit in April 2021 at the earliest, after the 80,000 b/d unit was shut on ...

The London Metal Exchange three-month copper price continued to trade comfortably above $7,000/mt as the bulls continued to circle the metal. Since the pandemic lows seen back in March, when copper went down to around $4,370/mt, the industrial metal has been powering forward. Early on in the session Nov. 25 the metal hit $7,360/mt — levels last seen in Jan. 2014 — and then gave back some of those gains. A number of factors have helped copper gains, including supply-side issues, a weaker dollar, record-breaking US stock markets and demand ...

Wood Mackenzie’s latest report shows most markets in Asia Pacific can expect to see cheaper levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) for renewables compared to coal by 2030. Across the region, new investments in renewables power are expected to be 23% lower cost than coal power on average by the end of the decade. Currently, renewables power costs about 16% more on average compared to coal power but has been at a discount to gas-fired power since 2019. Wood Mackenzie senior analyst Rishab Shrestha said: “Today, India and Australia are the ...

Fitch Ratings expects Indonesian coal selling prices and volumes to improve in 2021, which should support a modest improvement in credit metrics. Fitch assumes a recovery in the Indonesian 4,200kcal coal prices to USD32.5/tonne in 2021 from USD27/tonne in 2020. The improvement in prices started to materialise in late 2020 as Fitch expected. Fitch also expects aggregate volumes of the Fitch-rated miners to increase by about 6% in 2021, compared with the drop of 3% in 2020. Furthermore, most Indonesian coal miners have curtailed mining costs in 2020 due to ...

Crude oil processed by Indian refiners rose to its highest in seven months in October as fuel demand picked up although throughput remained lower than a year earlier, hurt by the coronavirus pandemic’s impact on industrial and transport activity. Crude oil throughput in October dropped 16.1% from a year earlier to 4.35 million barrels per day (18.39 million tonnes), but was the highest since March when the country went into a nationwide lockdown, provisional data issued by the government showed on Wednesday. Pointing to a recovery in economic activity, India’s ...

The US natural gas storage withdrawal season started one week later than normal with a below-average draw of 18 Bcf for the week ended Nov. 20 as the Henry Hub winter strip shows slight declines with demand somewhat muted for the week in progress. US natural gas storage inventories decreased to 3.940 Tcf for the week ended Nov. 20, the US Energy Information Administration said Nov. 25. The report was issued one day earlier than normal this week to accommodate the Thanksgiving holiday in the US. The withdrawal was less ...

Promising results from three potential coronavirus vaccines have raised hopes of an economic rebound in 2021, leading oil price to the highest mark since Mar 6. With stock prices of crude exploring and producing companies rallying, it is probably time for the energy sector to bounce back from the pandemic lows. Oil Price Recovers Partially Although the price of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude, approaching $46 per barrel, is significantly below the 2020-beginning price of more than $60 mark, the commodity price has improved considerably in the past few months. ...

U.S. stock index futures edged higher on Friday as optimism around an economic rebound next year outweighed concerns around an expected surge in coronavirus infections during the Thanksgiving holiday. Wall Street’s main indexes have gained more than 10% this month as investors bet on a sooner-than-expected COVID-19 vaccine and calmer global trade under President-elect Joe Biden, setting the S&P 500 for its best November ever. A rotation into sectors such as industrials and financials, deemed to benefit from an economic recovery, has also powered the Dow to record highs and ...

A couple of days prior, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide published a letter sent to us and signed by the crew of the vessel M/V Knightship, alleging that the ship had been stuck for many months in anchor, laden with coal, due to the trade tensions between China and Australia. All this time, crew members have been unable to disembark. Today, we received the owner’s reply, which, of course, we will publish accordingly here. According to the owner, Seanergy Maritime Holdings, the information mentioned in the letter is misleading, because while ...

GoodFuels, the leading marine biofuels supplier for the global maritime industry, and car manufacturer Volkswagen Group have successfully started their partnership in supplying GoodFuels’ advanced Bio-Fuel Oil (MR1-100 or BFO) at Vlissingen, the Netherlands – another major step for sustainable shipping in the car carrier segment. The Depth RoRo carrier Patara was bunkered with 100% GoodFuels’ Bio-Fuel Oil, which reduced the vessel’s CO2 emissions by a minimum of 85%, and all SOx emissions on their voyages between Emden (Germany), Dublin (Ireland), Santander (Spain) and Setubal (Portugal) with Volkswagen Group’s cargo. ...

Oil slipped from seven-month highs on Thursday as signs of growing supplies helped to halt a rally driven by optimism that COVID-19 vaccines will revive fuel demand. Brent futures had risen to nearly $50 a barrel this week after three major pharmaceutical companies announced progress on vaccines that could start to be rolled out before the end of the year. But Brent was down 74 cents, or 1.5%, at $47.87 a barrel by 1650 GMT on Thursday, having dropped as much as $1. The contract gained about 1.6% in the ...

Signing up more than one staff member to the company account in the Shipping KPI system provides users with access to valuable company performance information. Additionally, activating several user accounts, as opposed to just one or two, greatly lowers the risk of an inactive account if the staff member, or members, using the account, leaves the company. Since the creation of the Shipping KPI system in 2010, there has been a continuous increase in the total number of company accounts. Each account comes with at least one registered user. But ...

Baltic membership has grown significantly in recent years with new companies from tech to traders signing up to access services right across freight markets. Alongside those in Dry Cargo, Tankers, LPG and LNG, representatives from the air cargo and container markets are now also engaged as adoption of new Baltic benchmarks picks up traction. My role is all about engagement, finding out about the issues faced by firms at the commercial coalface and exploring how our services can help. Back in November 2008 when I joined the Baltic, my first ...

Marlink Group company Telemar has been awarded the contract to provide in-person and remote service support for bridge navigation equipment to NSC-Group fleet of vessels. NSC-Group is already a customer of Marlink’s smart network solutions, having renewed its agreement for provision of high bandwidth Sealink VSAT to its fleet in April 2020. The agreement with Telemar runs for five years and includes inspection, maintenance, testing and overhaul of bridge equipment including Radio Surveys, Voyage Data Recorders, Gyro Compass, X-band and S-band radars. Telemar will also provide NSC with access to ...