Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) \u2014 India\u2019s Reliance Industries (RELI.NS), operator of the world\u2019s largest refining complex in Gujarat, paid an unprecedented record charter fee of $23 million to $25 million for a Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC) to transport 2 million barrels of Basrah crude from Iraq, according to shipping sources cited by Reuters on Friday, August 7, 2026.<\/p>\n
The extreme freight surge\u2014marking a jump from a pre-war average of $2 million to 12 times the baseline global freight rate\u2014highlights severe shipping chokepoints in the Strait of Hormuz caused by the ongoing U.S.-Iran conflict. Daily vessel transits through the strategic waterway have plummeted from a pre-war average of 125\u2013140 ships to a fraction of normal capacity as shipowners avoid military risks.<\/p>\n
Key financial & logistics metrics<\/p>\n
Soaring Freight Rates: Reliance chartered the VLCC from South Korea\u2019s Sinokor at 1,200 points on the Worldscale freight index\u201412 times the reference benchmark\u2014up from pre-war levels of 0.8 to 0.9 times ($2 million total).<\/p>\n
Deep SOMO Discounts: To offset soaring shipping costs and attract buyers into the Gulf, the State Organization for Marketing of Oil (SOMO) offered steep discounts of $25 to $30 per barrel below Dubai regional benchmarks.<\/p>\n
Net Margin Offset: Despite the $25 million freight tag, energy analysts estimate Reliance will still save millions on the overall transaction due to Iraq\u2019s heavy crude price reductions.<\/p>\n
Limited Carrier Pool: Sinokor remains one of the few international maritime operators willing to navigate the Strait of Hormuz to load cargo at Iraq\u2019s Basra Oil Terminal.<\/p>\n
While Asian refiners\u2014particularly across India and China\u2014are actively seeking chartered tankers to capture Iraq\u2019s discounted crude allocations, shipowner reluctance continues to limit available tonnage entering the Gulf.<\/p>\n
By offering deep price concessions, Iraq\u2019s oil marketing arm is successfully maintaining crude flow off the Basra coast despite soaring war-risk insurance premiums and maritime transport bottlenecks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) \u2014 India\u2019s Reliance Industries (RELI.NS), operator of the world\u2019s largest refining complex in Gujarat, paid an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":240924,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[14],"tags":[5277,154,34,94,213,272],"class_list":["post-240923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-iraq","tag-basra","tag-energy","tag-iran","tag-iraq","tag-oil","tag-united-arab-emirates"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/117060277675426300","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240923\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}