European Commission raids Statoil, Shell offices on biofuels and oil price collusion allegations

May 16, 2013 |

In the EU, Fox Business is reporting that the office of Statoil and Royal Dutch Shell were subjected to “announced inspections,” also known as raids, over charges that unnamed companies have been allegedly reporting faked commodity prices to Platts’ Market-On-Close (MOC) price assessment reports. The price reports are used to generate benchmarks for regional and global trading in the physical fuels and derivatives markets.

The EC described the raids as a first step — and cautioned that allegations do not equate to evidence of guilt. “Even small distortions of assessed prices may have a huge impact on the prices of crude oil, refined oil products and biofuels purchases and sales, potentially harming final consumers,” the Commission told Fox.

Category: Fuels

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