Are you overpaying your bunker broker?

This is how most bunker brokers receive offers from physical suppliers.

In an unregulated market, this last sentence opens up an opportunity for the broker. They had agreed (with the bunker buyer) to a fixed commission of $1/mt, but what is stopping them adding $2, $3 or $4 per tonne? How will the buyer ever know?

If they manage it and the ultimate price agreed is X+$4/mt, the broker will invoice the physical supplier for $4/mt after the stem - a piece of the deal that the buyer never sees.

The whole dynamic of the trade has changed. The broker now benefits from selling at a higher price.