Trading and shipping giant Gunvor Group is stopping the use of agents as it looks to reduce risk and increase compliance across its operations.
The Swiss company said no more consultants or intermediaries will be employed to find new business or develop existing projects.
Gunvor has already reduced the number of middlemen by 45% since 2018, and by 30% in 2019 alone.
The group is now in the process of winding-down the remainder of consultant contracts.
A spokesperson for Gunvor told TradeWinds that shipbrokers are not included in the cull, however.
"This decision relates primarily to those 'agents' involved in origination, such as those intermediaries putting together large offtake deals with SOEs, as they pose a higher compliance risk. Shipbrokers do not fall into this category," he added.
The trading sector has been hit by a number of scandals this year, and Gunvor chief executive Torbjorn Tornqvist has tried to distance global traders from Singapore players mired in legal troubles.
"The lessons of the past bear on how Gunvor operates today, and when we identify areas in which our robust compliance standards cannot be exactly upheld, we take action," the CEO said on Thursday.
"To be clear, the company will do nothing short of ensuring that we are enforcing our zero-tolerance compliance policies. If we lose business as a result, so be it."
Tornqvist said the priority is to constantly improve how Gunvor conducts business in all areas.
Business model revamped
"In the last couple [of] years, we have overhauled our company and business model, and today, we’re clearly stronger as a result," he added.
Gunvor will also further assess its use of other consultants, including risk analysts and technical operational service providers.
The group owns or operates more than 100 vessels, including tankers and a "sizable" fleet of LNG ships, Gunvor said earlier this year. It's main logistics subsidiary is Clearlake Shipping, a major operator or chartered tonnage.
The trader has profited from booming rates as tankers were booked for storage contracts in 2020.
Tornqvist has previously expressed concern about the reputational fallout from a series of company failures embodied by the collapse of Singapore's Hin Leong Group, which went down under almost $4bn of debt after founder Lim Oon Kuin admitted in a court filing to hiding $800m of losses from lenders.
