Lots of Cargoes Transatlantic Clean

This week we will be taking a look at clean cargoes in the transatlantic trade in terms of volume and cargo lot size. These transaltlantic clean cargoes are going up as a consequence of U.S. refinery capacity failing to expand commensurate with oil consumption, plus a leveling off of the Caribbean refineries. Thus incremental clean product has to be imported from more distant sources. This year’s jump in fixture activity is partly due to greater imports to satisfy demand, and also partly from the impact of Hurricane Katrina on refinery operations (fixtures for 2005 as of mid-November are already 17% ahead of full-year 2004).