TFG Marine, the bunkering joint venture between Trafigura and John Fredriksen, has said 2022 will be a year of "accelerating consolidation".
The company said the current bunker market is unsustainable and it expects more players to exit for various reasons, including insufficient access to financial liquidity.
"The market is also becoming more transparent and more focused on managing the climate transition, with all the costs that will entail," the company said.
“For TFG Marine, this amounts to a unique opportunity to win business through innovation and the supply of alternative lower-carbon fuels and cooperation with other players, supported by an already strong brand, a solid financial position and a reputation for transparency.”
TFG Marine, which was founded in 2019, said the global tanker market provided a "sombre backdrop” in 2021, one of the toughest years on record for bunkering because of oversupply.
Despite this, the company claims to have made "strong progress", increasing its footprint and volumes in all regions, to the point where it is "already one of the top three physical bunker suppliers in the market".
In November, TFG Marine said it was on track to becoming one of the top five operators in Singapore, supplying close to 3m metric tonnes of marine fuels throughout 2021.
The company said a key advantage has been the strong financial backing of Trafigura.
"In the current environment of rising oil prices, this has enabled TFG Marine to provide favourable payment terms to customers where some other suppliers have struggled to do so," the company said.
“We work closely with Trafigura’s in-house trading and shipping teams to source and sell competitively priced fuels both to vessels under Trafigura time charters and to the wider shipping market.”
During the summer, TFG Marine delivered bunkers to an Ocean Network Express (ONE) container ship using a digital bunker delivery note, in what was hailed as an "industry first".
It carried out the pilot transaction in cooperation with ONE, DBS Bank and maritime digital developer Ascenz and the Maritime and Port Authority.
