Frontline Stock

Frontline Ltd. operates as an international shipping company.

The company engages primarily in the ownership and operation of oil and product tankers. The company operates through subsidiaries located in Cyprus, Bermuda, India, the Marshall Islands, Liberia, Norway, the United Kingdom, China and Singapore. The company also involved in the charter, purchase and sale of vessels.

As of December 31, 2022, the company’s fleet consisted of 70 vessels, with an aggregate capacity of approximately 13.1 million deadweight ton (DWT) 66 vessels owned by the company (21 very large crude carriers (VLCCs), 27 Suezmax tankers, 18 LR2/Aframax tankers); and four vessels that are under the company’s commercial management (two Suezmax tankers, and two Aframax tankers).

Furthermore, as of December 31, 2022, the company’s newbuilding program consisted of two VLCCs which were delivered in January 2023. As of December 31, 2022, the company’s owned fleet included 40 scrubber fitted vessels (17 VLCCs, 19 Suezmax tankers and four LR2/Aframax tankers). Additional scrubber installations are planned on two owned VLCCs in 2023. Following these scrubber installations, including the delivery of two scrubber-fitted vessels under the company’s newbuilding program in January 2023 and the sale of two vessels with scrubbers in January and February 2023, 64% of its owned fleet will have scrubbers installed.

The company owns various vessel owning and operating subsidiaries. The company’s operations take place substantially outside of the United States. The company’s subsidiaries, therefore, own and operate vessels that may be affected by changes in foreign governments and other economic and political conditions. The company engages in transporting crude oil and its related refined petroleum products and its vessels operate in the spot and time charter markets. The company’s VLCCs are specifically designed for the transportation of crude oil and, due to their size, are primarily used to transport crude oil from the Middle East Gulf to the Far East, Northern Europe, the Caribbean and the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, or LOOP. The company’s Suezmax tankers are similarly designed for worldwide trading, but the trade for these vessels is mainly in the Atlantic Basin, Middle East and Southeast Asia. The company’s LR2/ Aframax tankers are designed to be flexible, able to transport primarily refined products, but also fuel and crude oil from smaller ports limited by draft restrictions. The vessels will normally trade between the larger refinery centers around the world, being the Gulf of Mexico, Middle East, Rotterdam and Singapore.

The company is committed to providing quality transportation services to all of its customers and to developing and maintaining long-term relationships with the major charterers of tankers. Increasing global environmental concerns have created a demand in the petroleum products/crude oil seaborne transportation industry for vessels that are able to conform to the stringent environmental standards currently being imposed throughout the world.

Similar to structures commonly used by other shipping companies, the company’s vessels are all owned by, or chartered to, separate subsidiaries or associated companies. Frontline Management Cyprus Ltd, Frontline Management AS, Frontline Corporate Services Ltd and Frontline Management (Bermuda) Limited, all wholly owned subsidiaries, which the company refers to collectively as Frontline Management, support it in the implementation of its decisions. Frontline Management is responsible for the operational and commercial management of the company’s ship owning subsidiaries, including chartering and insurance, in the execution of the board's strategy. Each of the company’s vessels is registered under the Marshall Islands or Hong Kong flag.

In January 2023, the company sold the 2009-built VLCC, Front Eminence, and the 2009-built Suezmax tanker, Front Balder.

Strategy

The company’s principal focus is the transportation of crude oil and related refined petroleum cargoes for major oil companies and large oil trading companies. The company seeks to optimize its income and adjust its exposure through actively pursuing charter opportunities whether through spot charters, time charters, bareboat charters, sale and leasebacks, straight sales and purchases of vessels, newbuilding contracts and acquisitions.

The company operates VLCCs, Suezmax and Aframax tankers in the crude oil tanker market and LR2 tankers in the refined product market. The company’s preferred strategy is to have some fixed charter income coverage for its fleet, predominantly through time charters, and trade the balance of the fleet on the spot market. The company focuses on minimizing time spent in ballast by cross trading its vessels, typically with voyages loading in the Middle East Gulf discharging in Northern Europe, followed by a trans-Atlantic voyage to the U.S. Gulf of Mexico and, finally, a voyage from either the Caribbean, US Gulf or West Africa to the Far East/Indian Ocean. The key elements of the company’s strategy include emphasizing operational safety and quality maintenance for all of its vessels and crews; ensuring that the work environment on board and ashore always meet the highest standards complying with all safety and health regulations, labor conditions and respecting human rights; complying with all current and proposed environmental regulations; outsourcing technical management and crewing; achieving high utilization of its vessels; achieving a satisfactory mix of term charters, contracts of affreightment, or COAs, and spot voyages; and developing and maintaining relationships with major oil companies and industrial charterers.

The company continues to have a strategy of outsourcing, which includes the outsourcing of management, crewing and accounting services to a number of third party and competing suppliers. The technical management of the company’s vessels is provided by third party ship management companies. Pursuant to management agreements, each of the third party ship management companies provides ship maintenance, crewing, technical support, shipyard supervision and related services to it. A central part of the company’s strategy is to benchmark operational performance. The company’s vessels are crewed with Russian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Romanian, Indian and Filipino officers and crews, or combinations of these nationalities.

Regulations

Under Chapter IX of the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea of 1974, or the International Safety Management Code for the Safe Operation of Ships and for Pollution Prevention (the ISM Code), the company’s operations are subject to environmental standards and requirements. The company relies upon the safety management system that it and its technical managers have developed for compliance with the ISM Code.

History

Frontline plc was founded in 1985.