BGC Partners, a leading global brokerage and financial technology company, has purchased outright the tanker and gas specialist shipbroker Poten & Partners of New York.
The highly respected Poten & Partners tanker analyst Erik Broekhuizen frequently features in Tanker Shipping & Trade. All the staff are retained in the BGC Partners deal.
The financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed. BGC acquired 100% of Poten, which includes operations in New York, London, Singapore, Houston, Athens, Guangzhou and Perth.
BGC Partners is a conglomerate of companies including the publicly quoted property company Newmark Group, a string of financial services companies offering fixed income securities, interest rate swaps, foreign exchange, equities, and a commodity information company, Fenics Market Data.
BGC Partners president Shaun D Lynn said “We are excited about this strategic acquisition, which is very complementary to our current commodities offering. The addition of physical LNG, LPG and tanker brokerage, and energy consulting capabilities will allow BGC to expand its operations in the oil, gas and shipping sectors. Poten’s access to market intelligence and its highly regarded price reporting and analytical products, including LNG, LPG and asphalt will also add to our existing energy and commodities suite of market data solutions under Fenics Market Data.”
Poten & Partners chairman and chief executive Steven M Garten said “We are very excited to be part of BGC and feel BGC is uniquely positioned to support us in our next stage of growth. The combination of BGC and Poten will enable us to accelerate this, both organically and through targeted acquisitions.”
It is unusual for outsiders to enter the somewhat closed world of shipbroking, where many of the companies have been formed as breakaways. The consolidation process is usually driven by those within the industry, such as the Platou merger with Clarksons or that of Braemar and Seascope.
No doubt the implications of a financial services company entering the shipbroking sphere will be a subject of discussion at the coffee breaks during this week’s Tanker Shipping & Trade Conference, Awards & Exhibition, 20-21 November 2018.
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