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ABU DHABI/WAM
Adnoc announced on Thursday the fourth cohort of its prestigious Trading Academy, which prepares Adnoc’s UAE National talent for roles in the company’s world-class trading operations, Adnoc Global Trading (AGT) and Adnoc Trading (AT).
The cohort was announced at an event held at AGT’s offices in the presence of Dr Sultan bin Ahmed Al Jaber, Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology and Managing Director and Group CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc), and Sarah Al Amiri, Minister of Education.
Senior leaders from the education, Emiratisation and human resources sectors attended the event to learn about the academy and celebrate the achievements of Adnoc’s trading companies.
Since their establishment in 2020, these companies have grown rapidly and organically into sophisticated global traders of refined and crude products, expanding to more than 400 employees today from the five trading staff Adnoc employed in 2019. Adnoc’s products are now proactively traded, with cargos carefully managed to maximise value, hedging services used to manage risk and cargos transported, when possible, using Adnoc L&S vessels.
Dr Al Jaber said, “Adnoc’s trading operations have revolutionised the services we offer to our expanding global customer base, while unlocking significant value and driving new growth opportunities. Our world-class trading businesses are leveraging advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) to make informed data-driven decisions that generate greater returns from every molecule that we produce, process, and sell. As we continue to invest in UAE youth and strengthen their role in strategic sectors, Adnoc’s Trading Academy is equipping the country’s first generation of traders with the specialised skills needed to succeed in commodity trading.”
In 2016, President His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan set Adnoc the challenge to ‘stretch the margin from every barrel’ and deliver more value from its operations. Recognising the potential to derive more value from transportation and trading, Adnoc established two new trading companies: AT for crude oil and AGT for refined products.
The units now conduct more transactions in a day than Adnoc previously did in a year, delivering a return on investment of more than 17x the cost of establishing the trading business by the end of 2023. Trading has become a key pillar of Adnoc’s transformation into a progressive international energy company that services both physical and financial customers.
Adnoc’s Trading Academy has been a critical factor in the trading companies’ success. The academy’s rigorous two-year programme, exclusively open to Adnoc’s UAE National employees, provides comprehensive, on-the-job training that combines theory with practical skills learned through simulations and real-time market analysis. Since the Trading Academy’s inception in 2020, almost 40 UAE Nationals have graduated and are now working in AGT and AT.