Oil-Contango Trade Resumes as Shipping Rates Tempt Shell, Vitol

(Bloomberg) — Vitol Group, Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Gunvor International BV booked supertankers to store oil at sea as plunging shipping rates made the trade potentially more profitable again after a three-month gap, a shipbroker said.

Vitol, a closely held oil trader, hired three tankers at $45,000 a day each, capable of carrying a combined 6 million barrels of oil, Athens-based Optima Shipbrokers said today. Gunvor, shipper of a third of Russia

Four other shipbrokers, all of whom declined to be identified because the information is private, reported the same transactions. A spokeswoman for Vitol declined to comment, as did a spokesman for Gunvor. A spokesman for Shell didn