The High Court has ruled that a bespoke hire rate formula in an LNG time charterparty did not entitle the owner to additional hire when the relative value of the reference indices inverted as a consequence of the Russia‑Ukraine invasion, the report said. Sources published the account of the decision on 28 August 2026, citing the judgment in Briety Shipping Inc v Trafigura Maritime Logistics Pte Ltd [2026] EWHC 1714 (Comm).
The dispute concerned a tailored commercial formula used to calculate hire under an LNG time charterparty, and whether that formula authorised an upward payment to the owner once the market relationship between the referenced indices reversed. The parties named in the litigation were Briety Shipping Inc and Trafigura Maritime Logistics Pte Ltd, and the outcome was recorded in the Commercial Court citation given above.
The court’s determination turned on the contractual effect of the bespoke hire rate mechanism. In the ruling reported, the court held that the mechanism as written did not operate so as to give the owner entitlement to supplementary hire when the relative values of the stated indices became inverted following the geopolitical events described.
The contractual issue
At the heart of the claim was a question of contractual construction: whether the bespoke clause created an automatic adjustment in the owner’s favour once specified market indicators moved beyond their historical relationships. The High Court’s decision, as reported, concluded that the particular drafting of the bespoke hire rate formula did not produce the result advanced by the owner.
The report notes the inversion of the reference indices was a consequence of the Russia‑Ukraine invasion, an external event that altered the relative market values used in the formula. The ruling recorded that, despite that change in market circumstances, the contractual formula did not translate the inversion into an obligation for the charterer to pay additional hire beyond the parties’ agreed mechanism.
Narrow holding, broad attention
Although the reported decision addresses a discrete contractual provision in one charterparty, the practical question it raises is familiar to shipping markets: how bespoke clauses behave when unprecedented market shifts occur. The court’s treatment of the bespoke hire formula in this case will be read for guidance on the limits of such drafting, albeit the ruling itself rests on the language used between these particular parties.
reports supplied the account of the judgment on 28 August 2026. The published report provided the case name and citation as the principal identifiers of the decision and summarised the outcome that the bespoke hire rate formula did not entitle the owner to additional hire in the circumstances described.
The High Court judgment in Briety Shipping Inc v Trafigura Maritime Logistics Pte Ltd [2026] EWHC 1714 (Comm) thus recorded a ruling confined to the meaning and application of a specific contractual mechanism within an LNG time charterparty. Market participants, charterers and owners alike will note the decision for what it says about the effect of bespoke pricing formulas when underlying index relationships change.