Products Trader at Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC)

What’s in it for you?

• At Shell Downstream South Africa, we are interested in attracting people to our business who share our core values of honesty and integrity, have strong commercial acumen and a delivery focus. We want individuals who are hands-on, who are prepared to accept accountability, who go beyond their job description and can achieve great results through teamwork.
• It is essential that the successful candidate is a highly motivated and driven individual who contributes to a warm and pleasant environment and a One team atmosphere.
• The South African Deal Making team is the centre piece of the fuels value chain’s competitive strategy. Thorough understanding of the several relevant market levers (Trading, Supply, Wholesale, Retail, etc.) is a central task to this role. The competitiveness of other COB’s (e.g., Retail, Cards, and Manufacturing) depends heavily on the success of this team.

What’s the role?

• The Products Trader is a senior dealmaker responsible for developing term and spot hydrocarbon contracting strategies for deep sea imports and exports in line with the Integrate Performance Unit (IPU) optimal plan and to negotiate, structure and manage commercial contracts with the Shell Global Trading Network (GTN), Other Oil Companies (OOC’s) and third party independent/transformed traders.
• He / She works in close collaboration with other interfaces in the Trading & Supply (T&S) organisation to ensure alignment of end-to-end objectives and integrated outcomes for the enterprise, balancing consideration for robustness of third-party options, in compliance with Shell Business Principles and HSSE standards.

Key Responsibilities:

• The position is an Individual Performer role and will report directly into the Deal Making Manager for South Africa.  
• The Products Trader is responsible to ensure the development and execution of a sourcing and selling strategy for the deep sea imports and exports of finished hydrocarbon products (consisting of both White Oil (WO) and Black Oil (BO)) and/or component grades from the Shell GTN (SITME, STR and SIETCO), OOC’s and third party independent/transformed traders in a way that balances the IPU and optimizes against relative local refinery purchases and GRM economics in line with an optimization steer.
• He / She will own the trading interface and relationships with the Shell GTN, OOC’s and third party independent traders for deep sea imports and exports ensuring competitively sourced import barrels in line with the Price Risk Management (PRM) strategy.
• The Products Trader is responsible for managing and developing the trading relationships, structuring contractual arrangements, and exceeding financial bottom line targets set by the Business in line with the Shell HSSE and Trading Compliance standards (including Russian Nexus protocols).  
• The Products Trader, supported by Operations and various Subject Matter Experts (SME’s), owns the full commercial process from origination, the physical delivery to receiving cash in the bank. He / She will provide front line trading activities and be responsible for the end-to-end trading deal execution and management (both relationship and transactional) across all partner interfaces both internal and external.
• The Products Trader will be responsible for New Business Development (NBD) in the portfolio to deliver stretched P&L targets and maximize integrated trading value for the Shell GTN.
• One team mindset – across T&S and the IPU as well as effective collaboration with the Shell Trading joint venture in South Africa (Sekelo) and the Shell GTN (SITME, STR and SIETCO).
• Close Collaboration with internal businesses partners and functions, specifically T&S Operations, Business Development, Product Quality (PQ), HSSE, Legal, Tax, Credit, Ethics and Compliance (E&C) and Finance.
• To provide commercial and strategic leadership from a Deal Making perspective in support of the broader T&S Transformation ambitions and Energy Transition initiatives.
• The Products Trader will serve as backup support for the other Hydrocarbon Deal Makers responsible for trading (sourcing and selling) finished hydrocarbon products from local refiners and oil majors on a term and spot basis.
• Monitor and maintain a controlled environment, including adherence to the Shell Code of conduct, manual of authorities and control framework.
• To maintain contract management excellence in line with the respective framework and ensuring HSSE and Shell Trading Compliance (including enhanced IDD/KYC screenings, Russian Nexus protocols, etc.) adherence of all counterparts within the trading portfolio.
• The incumbent will maintain good administrative and financial controls to ensure proper month-end and year-end financial close out of the Trading books and operational excellence.
• Drive integrated value for Shell across the IPU & GTN.
• Deal with temporary supply restrictions in a highly dynamic fuel market with increasing competitive pressures.
• Deal with extremely high price volatility
• Requires strong interpersonal skills with the ability to interface across all levels in the organization.
• Requires strong organizational skills as the individual will be required to manage multiple tasks with changing priorities and make decisions under pressure, both time and impact.
• Due to the nature of the business and the job, working hours of this position often extend beyond normal office hours.
• Derive correct decisions from a high amount of data and trigger clear information flow
• Ensure maintenance of FIFO results in a Hydrocarbon book and cash forecasting activities.
• Screen the external landscape and competitor evolution for transformation linked initiatives which will impact commercial delivery for Deal Making.
• Determine the impact of the transformation PLFSC within the Deal Making portfolio and develop a response plan to meet these changes.
• Developing term and spot hydrocarbon contracting strategies for deep sea imports and exports with steering input from the Channel/Product Optimisation (CO/PO) teams.
• Responsible for negotiating, structuring contractual arrangements and managing commercial contracts with the Shell GTN, OOC’s and third party independent/transformed traders. The contracting objective is to maximize Enterprise values, to enable supply chain robustness and creating optionality.
• Contributes to maximizing Enterprise Integrated Value through.
• Being a key interface to the supply/refining market Bringing meaningful market insights into the optimization process Generating opportunities based on the knowledge of the Shell system and matching those to local or regional market trends Maximize value from marginal barrels disposition in the spot market Explore optimization opportunities on local 3rd party options (hydrocarbons) Represent Hydrocarbon Deal Making (HCDM) in the Sales and Operations Planning (S&OP) process.

What we need from you?

• A degree or equivalent qualification in Engineering, Operations, Finance, Accounting, Economics, Sciences/Maths.
• At least 5 years of relevant experience.
• Broad knowledge of oil markets and industry is preferred.
• Extensive trading capabilities and understanding trading business activities in the region.
• Experience of /creating/driving/delivering operational excellence e.g., internal continuous improvement programs etc.
• Strong leadership, communication, stakeholder management and engagement skills.
• Commercial acumen.
• Established experience of negotiations.
• Understand external regulations to protect the business from fines and penalties.
• Understand internal business drivers to improve data, information, and processes to impact the business bottom line.
• Established working experience in trading/supply technical role.
• Thorough understanding of the GTN, trading systems and operations processes.
• Experience in cross function and cross business teams.
• Highly numerate with good analytical capacities.
• Attention to detail.
• Delivering results through others.
• Delivers under pressure.
• Project Management.
• Compliance Control, Risk & Exposure Management.