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Saudi Arabia is tripling its value added tax (VAT) as part of austerity measures to support its coronavirus-hit economy.

The government in Riyadh also said it will suspend its cost of living allowance to shore up state finances.

The oil-rich nation has seen its income plummet as the impact of the pandemic has forced down global energy prices.

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-52612785

Lets hope so:-

https://www.hellenicshippingnews.com/shipowners-forge-ahead-with-scrubbers-despite-narrowing-high-low-sulfur-spread/

Shipping companies are pushing ahead with multi-million dollar investments to install emission-washing scrubber systems aboard their ships, despite concerns that a narrowing spread between high and low sulfur fuel prices could delay the return on those investments.

Well folks the perfect storm has arrived but can Quadrise capitalise? Can they pull their finger out? Do we need a change in line up at the board? Is it too late? Or are they poised to strike? Sounds like an episode in Batman:-

As a result of the oil price collapse the spread between the smokey high sulfer fuel & the even smokier toxic low sulfer unstable fuel oil has narrowed significantly meaning those shippers who invested $millions in scrubbers with the expectation that the investment would be paid back tout suite due to the wider fuel spread will now be panicking and hurting financially so how does this benefit Quadrise: MSAR has always been cheaper than HFO + their are some environmental benefits such as clean burn, no smoke and reduced Nox. MSAR may just give those scrubber equipped vessels back; that economic edge over the toxic stuff. If team Quad cannot Capitalise in a perfect storm then they never will.
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All that has changed. On Tuesday, in the wake of the historic 24% slide in the price of crude the previous day, “quotes for compliant fuel [VLSFO] out of Singapore, Rotterdam and Fujairah [were] falling close to 20% on the day,” said Clarksons analyst Frode Mørkedal. “HFO bunker fuel has not seen the same moves. This has made fuel spreads non-existent on the day, with scrubber premiums closing in on zero.”

Clarksons estimates scrubber savings are down to just $1,400 per day for Capesizes and $1,200 per day for VLCCs. These represent declines from January highs of 86% and 95%, respectively.

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/coronavirus-is-decimating-imo-2020-ship-scrubber-savings

"The number one issue with sustainable aviation fuel currently is availability, or lack thereof. In fact, despite the huge potential for environmental benefits, sustainable aviation fuels remain scarce. To put this into context, yesterday Lufthansa’s CEO Carsten Spohr said that if the entire global supply of sustainable aviation fuel was used across Lufthansa’s operations It would only last for 36 hours."

https://simpleflying.com/lufthansa-sustainable-aviation-fuel-36-hours/

Montreal group aims to turn industrial CO2 into sustainable aviation fuel:-

https://www.skiesmag.com/news/montreal-saf-sustainable-aviation-fuel/

Rolls-Royce’s chief technology officer, Paul Stein, believes that revenue passenger flights with electric aircraft are possible by 2029, but insists that substantial advances in sustainable aviation fuel production must accompany the drive towards such technology.

While hybrid-electric aircraft could potentially be in service by the end of the decade, Stein stresses that two-thirds of all jet fuel is used on sectors longer than 1,000nm – a threshold at the far fringes of even the most optimistic forecasts for early electric aircraft range.

https://www.flightglobal.com/air-transport/sustainable-fuel-advances-must-parallel-electric-aircraft-evolution-rolls-royce/137074.article

Extracted the following quotes from the S&B Article:-

1/ "The stockpiling effect is also giving the start of this year a phoney war feeling for another reason: the long-awaited VLSFO compatibility problems are being postponed."

2/ "Current prices can't last forever; at some stage soon the bunker industry will need far more working capital than it has been used to operating on for the past few years, and it is unclear how the industry will cope if the bankers prove unaccommodating."

3/ "The bunker industry is aware that the alternative fuels are taking a growing slice of the market, and that the environmental regulations pushing them have the potential to be far more disruptive than the ones governing sulfur emissions, but as yet there is little appetite to bring them within the businesses of the conventional bunker sellers.
And with the industry and wider society still completely uncertain over which fuel is likely to become dominant as shipping addresses the IMO 2050 target, now may well not be the right time to be spending much time investigating the alternatives.
As with several other factors affecting the industry, this one will be on the back burner until we all have a better picture of what happened on January 1."
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Above last quote is on message with what Quadrise have been stating.

https://shipandbunker.com/news/world/190065-feature-what-ip-week-told-us-about-the-bunker-industry

“Where we will be in ten years is difficult to say,” said Spliethoff’s Arne Hubregtse. “We do need greener fuels, but there are many technologies and challenges to overcome: energy density, storage, operating temperatures and pressures. There is a lot of research going on by engine manufacturers to find a solution.”
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Greener MSAR SFO would be a good start, frustratingly the message does not seem to be getting out or if it is why aren't folks listening.

IMHO these regulations should have ensured exhaust gas treatment was the primary method of removing Sulphur from the exhaust gas as a post treatment rather than creating lots more carbon producing an even smokier toxic fuel packaged as the low sulfer fuel oil. However your big players ensured refiners would take the brunt of the costs rather than the shippers but in reality those shippers are paying the premium for the the refined fuel anyway.
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A shipowner panel comprising Grimaldi Group, Genco Shipping and Trading, and Spliethoff informed delegates that, despite initial installation problems, there had been little by way of mechanical breakdown, corrosion or non-compliant operation. All panel members said that their EGCS installations were removing substantially more sulphur emissions than the 0.50% required to comply with the global sulphur cap.

https://seanews.co.uk/features/scrubbers-removing-more-sulphur-than-required-experts/

Morocco status was included in the proactive update two weeks ago:-

https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/news/913068/quadrise-fuels--mike-kirk-highlights-progress-across-pipeline-of-business-opportunities-913068.html

“IMO 2020 was already going to make this a year of huge disruption for the entire maritime industry,” said Marc Iampieri, a managing director in the transportation and infrastructure practice at AlixPartners. “Throw in the coronavirus, the recent deterioration of some key financial measures and whatever other unforeseen disruptions lie ahead, and it’s clear that preparing for the worst may be the best way to avoid the worst.”
Source: Alix Partners

https://www.hellenicshippingnews.com/frustration-with-rising-non-transparent-prices-as-imo-2020-takes-hold-could-haunt-the-container-shipping-sector-says-alixpartners-study/

Just a little more on this as to why MSAR can help reduce KSA's fuel burdening costs:-

Fuel oil demand in Saudi Arabia rising:-

"The expected oversupply of HSFO after January 2020 will benefit major importer of the product, Saudi Arabia, who consumes it for domestic power generation and desalination plants. While the Kingdom also exports fuel oil, it is overall net short. It buys via spot and term tenders, with a significant uptick in imports during the summer. Vitol, Trafigura and Socar are some of the regular suppliers into the area, as are Saudi Aramco themselves via trading subsidiary, ATC.

The more relaxed Saudi import specification has a density of .992d max, 380cst and 3.7% sulphur so they can look at varied HSFO grades. This means that they can import and burn the very high 4.00% (maximum) sulphur fuel from Greek refiner Hellenic Petroleum, loaded out of Aspropyrgos. Overall Saudi fuel oil imports in 2018 were observed to be over 10.3m mt, up from around 7.9m mt the previous year, off the back of lower crude oil use in direct burn and increased need for fuel oil in expanding power plant and desalination facilities."
https://www.vortexa.com/insight/insight-report-hsfo-demand-in-mideast-gulf

Yeah Myrtle am also topping up. Can we have it lower again please say sub 3p would be just great. Thanks.

https://asiatimes.com/2020/02/virus-crisis-a-killer-for-global-oil-prices/

"Saudi Arabia, however, is in a comparative quandary. The kingdom has one of the lowest oil production break-even points, with its so-called fiscal breakeven point at around $80-$85 per barrel, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Others claim that the kingdom needs oil prices to be at least $75 per barrel to balance its increasingly imperilled national accounts."
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Wow, looks like KSA needs MSAR more than ever to help reduce that balance on its increasingly imperilled national accounts!

"Independent naval architect and marine engineering specialist Foreship reports a growing number of owners are reviewing their decisions on the best way to meet IMO 2020 emissions restrictions. The consultancy says it has seen an unprecedented surge of enquiries on how exhaust gas cleaning systems can be fitted at short notice, following emerging market misgivings over the quality and availability of 0.5 per cent sulphur content fuel oils."

https://shipinsight.com/articles/foreship-sees-scrubber-enquiries-surge

"Ed Schouwstra, commercial director at Netherlands-headquartered Stolt Tanker Trading told delegates: “The [IMO 2020] impact is roughly $130m - our profit was only around $67m last year so [the effect] is huge.”"

https://www.icis.com/explore/resources/news/2020/02/21/10473748/wbo-20-shippers-hit-with-extra-costs-vessel-issues-amid-imo-2020

"several problems have been found at inspection of ports as a result of the switch to LSFO. Usman was quoted to have said: ‘Issues found have been increased wear of engine cylinder components; unstable combustion; increased sludge issue at purifiers and fuel solidifying in the tank, particularly at cold climates.’"

https://www.bunkerspot.com/global/49965-global-imo-2020-hits-shipping-companies-with-extra-costs

Almost 7p without news.

Whats going on.

Makes you wonder what price after planning and funding secured.

“We recognise that fossil LNG is not the final solution for decarbonization,” Carnival said by email. But the company considers it “an important stepping stone to our industry’s ongoing objective to reduce its carbon footprint.”

https://grist.org/energy/do-cruise-companies-green-claims-hold-water/
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The same could be said of MSAR SFO, lets hope Quadrise are conveying the same message!

Ideally close to or meeting the overheads for the business as a starter for ten. However if they land contracts on the back of this small scale trial then the confidence value would be priceless and to use proactive Andrew Scott's words " would put Quadrise into first gear" IMHO.