Introduction
Marine oil business involves transport of oil or using marine means, either oceanic or by sea for sale or purchase at their destination. Most of the marine vessels that transport oil move in large numbers called a fleet. Aristotle Onassis and Stavros Niarchos once owned the two largest fleets of oil tankers in private hands. The fleets transported over five billion full gallons of crude oil. Thereafter, both of them became almost immeasurably wealthy and powerful. Of course, they continued to reinvest and carried on with their brotherly rivalry. They raced to outdo each other both in real estate purchases and in building bigger supertanker fleets. This paper focusses on the rivalry between Aristotle and Stavros in the oil business. It also discusses the issues that prevented the US from profiting from this oil business as well as the measures that the country took to fix this problem.
Aristotle Onassis and Stavros Niarchos Tanker Fleets
Aristotle and Stavros borrowed Norwegian expertise and were favored by the international conditions. Norwegians were the main independent owners of oil tankers during the interwar period ("Oil & Gas in Europe" 13). Stanley Sturmey reports that it was when the Norwegians purchased a few dozen tankers independently from Anglo-Saxon oil in the late 1920s on time charters that Norwegian tanker fleet flourished.
Before the Second World War, it became the biggest independent tanker fleet. Seeing this, Aristotle and Stavros also bought oil tankers on time-charters in the late 1940s and through 1950s from American oil companies ("Oil & Gas in Europe" 21). In fact, they further ameliorated the method by placing an order for a standard series of tankers at one shipyard. Onassis transformed a Canadian destroyer chaperone into the most sumptuous yacht in the world and named it ‘Christina’. Stavros built the world’s biggest sailing vessel known as ‘Creole’.
The Seven Sisters
‘Seven Sisters’ was a term created by a businessperson named Enrico Mattei, the then head of Italian state oil company called Eni. He did this to describe seven oil companies that formed ‘Consortium for Iran’ cartel, furthermore dominated the whole global petroleum industry from mid-1940s through the 1970s ("Oil & Gas in Europe" 31). The group consisted of Anglo-Persian Oil Company; Mobil; Gulf Oil; Royal Dutch Shell; Standard Oil of New Jersey; Texaco and Chevron.
As compared to the Greek tanker companies, the ‘Seven Sisters’ were well renowned and more developed which made them stand out both locally and internationally up against the Greek tanker companies (Cordier 42).
Profit Fallback US Faced in the Oil Business
The greatest fallback that the US oil businesses faced was the ban on oil exports. For an extended period, export of oil from the US was prohibited and highly illegal. In 1975, the US blocked almost all exports of crude oil (Cordier 42). This led to a pushdown of domestic prices even more than the foreign prices. Oil businesses in the United States were at their worst at this period. For 40 years not a person, an organization or even an oil company was allowed to export crude oil. The economy was degraded drastically, but there was light at the end of that dark tunnel.
Solution for the Profit Fallback
It was until 2014 when the U.S decided to reopen the door a crack (Cordier 43). It allowed export of minimally processed oil that was ultra-light and was known as Consolidate. In 2015, it permitted export with Mexico. On December 18th, the 40-year-old ban on oil export was lifted as part of the omnibus budget bill. Republicans and the oil industry championed the proposal. Reluctant democrats also supported it because they were able to negotiate.
Works Cited
"Oil & Gas in Europe." Oil & Gas Industry Profile: Europe (2016): 1-40. Business Source Complete. Web. 4 Apr. 2016.
Cordier, James. "Exploiting Crude Oil Volatility." Modern Trader (2016): 42-44. Business Source Complete. Web. 4 Apr. 2016.
