Vitol CEO confirms energy trading giant is getting into metals
Vitol Group confirmed that it’s starting rebuild a trading book for metals after a long stint out of the market, with an “exciting decade” ahead.
“It’s a relatively small addition to our business,” CEO Russell Hardy said at the Financial Times Commodities Summit on Tuesday.
Hardy’s comments are the first public acknowledgment of a step the energy trading giant has been making over the past six months. Vitol brought in an iron ore trader last year, Bloomberg previously reported. It’s also in the process of hiring two base metals traders who recently left rival Mercuria Energy Group, Reuters reported last week.
The buildout comes as Vitol — the world’s biggest independent commodities trader — expands beyond oil, gas and power after banking net profits of more than $28-billion in the past two years.
The firm was burned by an earlier foray into metals trading when it bought Euromin — a company that focused on trading metals, especially in the former Soviet Union, in the 1990s.
“I wouldn’t describe it as our finest hour — we struggled a little bit with managing the risks,” Hardy said. “So we’re very much starting from scratch again and really we’re just scratching the surface.”
Comments
Press Office
Announcements
What's On
Subscribe to improve your user experience...
Option 1 (equivalent of R125 a month):
Receive a weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine
(print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
Receive daily email newsletters
Access to full search results
Access archive of magazine back copies
Access to Projects in Progress
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format
Option 2 (equivalent of R375 a month):
All benefits from Option 1
PLUS
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports, in PDF format, on various industrial and mining sectors
including Electricity; Water; Energy Transition; Hydrogen; Roads, Rail and Ports; Coal; Gold; Platinum; Battery Metals; etc.
Already a subscriber?
Forgotten your password?
Receive weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine (print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
➕
Recieve daily email newsletters
➕
Access to full search results
➕
Access archive of magazine back copies
➕
Access to Projects in Progress
➕
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format
RESEARCH CHANNEL AFRICA
R4500 (equivalent of R375 a month)
SUBSCRIBEAll benefits from Option 1
➕
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports on various industrial and mining sectors, in PDF format, including on:
Electricity
➕
Water
➕
Energy Transition
➕
Hydrogen
➕
Roads, Rail and Ports
➕
Coal
➕
Gold
➕
Platinum
➕
Battery Metals
➕
etc.
Receive all benefits from Option 1 or Option 2 delivered to numerous people at your company
➕
Multiple User names and Passwords for simultaneous log-ins
➕
Intranet integration access to all in your organisation