Panama Canal Sets New Auction Record as Korean LPG Carrier Pays $5.3 Million
26 August 2026 For the second time in a month, a South Korean shipowner has broken the record for the highest transit fee ever paid at the Panama Canal. Bloomberg reports that SK Gas, the LPG trading arm of SK Group, has agreed to pay $5.3 million for a booking slot allowing its carrier G. Spirit to transit the canal’s locks on 1 September. Without the payment, the vessel would still make the crossing, but only after a wait of up to eleven days. The record is the latest marker in a trend we highlighted last week, when the Canal Authority’s decision to cut daily transits from 3 September – falling from 36 to 34, and to 32 from 15 September – set the stage for exactly this kind of premium. It follows hard on the heels of the $4.6 million paid earlier this month by SK Shipping to move a near-identical carrier, G. Arete, on the same long-standing rotation between the Houston Ship Channel and East Asian markets. Two forces are compounding here. The first is demand-side: the conflict in the Strait of Hormuz has curtailed Gulf energy shipments to Asia, pushing up LPG prices and squeezing South Korean traders, who are reportedly seeking to offset domestic losses through more profitable positioning elsewhere in the global market. The second is supply-side: an El Niño-driven drought has forced the Canal Authority to reduce both maximum vessel draught and, from this week, the number of daily transit slots available. The result is a market in which the auction premium for priority passage has become a genuine cost of doing business rather than an occasional anomaly. For trading and logistics operators, the lesson from two record-breaking bids inside a month is the same one this drought has been signalling since it began: canal capacity is no longer a given, and route planning now needs to price that risk in as a matter of course, not an exception.
Nigeria Expands Clean Energy Logistics with New LPG Carrier
19th August 2025 Nigeria’s President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has commissioned the new 40,000 CBM Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) carrier built for West Africa Gas Limited (WAGL)—a joint venture between NNPC Ltd. and Sahara Group. The commissioning of MT Iyaloja (Lagos) marks more than fleet expansion; it underscores Nigeria’s growing role in regional energy flows, particularly as LPG emerges as a cleaner transition fuel across Africa. Speaking on behalf of the President, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Gas), Rt. Hon. Ekperikpe Ekpo, praised WAGL and its partners for their strategic foresight in bridging critical energy infrastructure gaps. From a commodities and logistics perspective, the carrier strengthens supply chains from refinery output to end-user delivery, enhancing affordability, reliability, and regional distribution. With WAGL’s fleet capacity now exceeding 162,000 CBM, plans to add both a Small Gas Carrier and a Very Large Gas Carrier (VLGC) will further integrate Nigeria into global commodity flows. The ship’s name, Iyaloja (“Leader of the Market” in Yoruba), honours Alhaja Abibatu Mogaji MFR, the late mother of President Tinubu, with the commissioning ceremony featuring a ribbon cutting by the current Iyaloja-General of Nigeria, Alhaja Folasade Mujidat Tinubu-Ojo. In commodities terms, this story is about more than ships—it highlights energy logistics as the backbone of refinery output, cross-border trade, and Africa’s integration into global clean energy markets.