News
Cover photo: The Fos Da Vinci tanker sold to Russia. Photo: MarineTraffic / Lester Hunt
At the end of 2023, the European Union banned the direct sale of ships to Russian companies, but this had little impact on Russia’s oil sector. Since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, European and American shipowners have sold at least 230 aging tankers to the “shadow fleet,” which Russia uses to bypass Western oil export sanctions. Western companies earned £4.8 billion (close to $6 billion) from these sales, according to Shadow Fleet Secrets — an investigation initiated by the Dutch outlet Follow the Money and carried out in partnership with 13 other newsrooms from around the world.
The tankers were sold by companies from 21 of the 35 nations that imposed sanctions on Russian oil and bought by entities based in India, Hong Kong, Vietnam, and the Seychelles — countries that have not sanctioned Russia. Greek owners accounted for the largest share of sales, offloading 127 vessels. UK-based companies sold 22 tankers, while German and Norwegian owners sold 11 and 8, respectively. Most of these ships would have otherwise been scrapped for significantly lower prices.
Western authorities claim that Russia’s shadow fleet is used not only to transport oil and to conduct espionage, but also to study — and, in some cases, sabotage — critical underwater infrastructure, such as communication cables. According to the investigation, Russia has earned over €800 billion from fossil fuel exports since the full-scale war began. Energy revenues make up 20–50% of the Russian federal budget, playing a crucial role in funding its invasion of Ukraine.
The Follow the Money team, alongside the independent Kyiv School of Economics (KSE), analyzed hundreds of shipping and vessel registration records. KSE researchers estimate that the shadow fleet consists of around 600 vessels, which transport roughly 70% of Russia’s oil exports.
Journalists note that Western oil sanctions against Russia have had a direct impact on the global ship scrap market, causing prices for vessels registrable in non-Western jurisdictions to skyrocket. “Many European shipowners had old vessels they considered virtually worthless,” explained an analyst from British shipping journal Lloyd’s List. “But suddenly, their value doubled, and they rushed to sell them.”
Some owners have made significant profits, reselling vessels at much higher prices than they originally paid. One notable case is Greek businessman and film producer Paris Latsis — heir to one of Greece’s wealthiest families and once engaged to American socialite Paris Hilton. His company, Marla Tankers, sold two oil tankers — the Fos Picasso and Fos Da Vinci (pictured in the cover photo above) — for $84 million. Just six years earlier, he had purchased them for just under $50 million.
Less than a month after their most recent sale, both tankers set a course for Russia. In the Baltic port of Ust-Luga, near the Estonian border, they were loaded with over 120 million liters of Russian crude — an amount worth around $50 million, according to Bloomberg Terminal estimates.