Modupe Gbadeyanka
By Modupe Gbadeyanka
Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mr Maikanti Baru, has charged oil traders under the purview of the corporation to sharpen their skills for the challenges ahead as the national oil company seeks to activate its vision of becoming a dominant player in the trading of petroleum products and crude oil in the international market.
Mr Baru gave this charge on Wednesday at the NNPC Towers, Abuja while receiving participants billed to depart for onsite customized oil traders training programme organized by the Oxford Princeton, London, for select NNPC Staff.
“Trading on the major international platforms like the London mercantile exchange, the New York NYMEX, and of course Singapore requires in-depth understanding. It also requires total loyalty and commitment to your entity, as in the oil and gas industry, the margins are small so the volume definitely matters. We rely on you to make things happen,” he implored.
The NNPC boss noted that because successful trading required in-depth networking, the trainees must do everything possible to develop and sustain a rich pool of contacts within the trading world.
He recalled that various attempts made by the NNPC Management in the past to have a strong hold on oil trading had not yielded the expected dividend because the Corporation relied on the so-called big trading companies to transfer trading skills to NNPC Staff during routine secondment.
“It is our aspiration that this crop of trainees would eventually realize our dream,” Mr Baru said.
The training programme is designed to equip the participants with crude oil trading fundamentals and develop their capacity to compete in the global trading space. The course is billed to take-off on February 6, 2017.
Trainees would be taken through the general introduction of trading of physical crude with focus on the steps involved in negotiating crude oil transaction and they would also be made to understand the fundamentals of petroleum refining with focus on the operational modus of refineries and its effects on global oil and products prices.
The new traders would be grilled on the rudiments of exchange traded futures contracts, how to limit price risk exposure in the crude oil trading business, shipping, risk management, bidding and tendering processes documentation among others.
The training would climax with site visits to refineries, petroleum exchange and banks ahead of scheduled evaluation and assessment process of all participants.
Speaking on behalf of the trainees, Mallam Inuwa Waya, Managing Director of NNPC Trading assured that the participants were prepared to accept the challenge ahead and maximize the opportunities on offer during the programme and beyond.
