A unit of Delta Corp Holdings is pursuing $31m in claims in a contract dispute with Dubai’s OQ Trading.
The two sides have been locked in London arbitration and London-headquartered Delta has just filed an asset seizure lawsuit in New York, court records show.
Delta Corp Shipping, a Singapore affiliate of the bulk logistics company that is seeking a US listing, has alleged in the New York lawsuit that OQ breached a contract of affreightment.
The company’s lawyers, Noe Hamra and Thomas Belknap of law firm Blank Rome, said that Delta Corp Shipping struck a deal with the trader in 2022 to carry 600,000 tonnes of urea from the Baltic Sea to India.
The shipments were to take place in 50,000-tonne monthly increments.
However, no shipments took place between November 2022 and May 2023 because of the ice season in the Baltic, and the shipments did not resume despite there being 450,000 tonnes left on the contract, the lawyers argued.
“Defendant failed to nominate any more fixtures in 2023, thereby defaulting on the remaining nine fixtures,” Hamra and Belknap wrote.
OQ declined to comment for this story. The company has yet to file a response in the New York lawsuit, and London arbitration proceedings are secret.
Based in Dubai, the commodities trader is controlled by the government of Oman.
Court papers show that arbitration started in May, with Delta Corp claiming the contract breach cost it more than $24.7m in estimated losses.
In the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, Delta Corp has also asked a judge to seize more than $31.2m in OQ assets to secure its claim. The figure includes $5.39m in interest and about $617,000 in legal fees.
Delta Corp is targeting OQ’s account at JP Morgan Chase in New York.
