Can Besev, CEO, Suzun Marine Fuels. Image Credit: Suzun Marine Fuels

At Suzun Marine Fuels, we have chosen a path that may seem unusual for a supplier. We have limited the number of bunker traders we work with to a maximum of ten — the number of fingers on both hands. Nature gave us ten fingers for a reason: it is the right number to grasp things firmly without losing control. In the same spirit, we manage our indirect sales — transactions involving intermediaries — within this framework.

Many suppliers say they want to “see everything in the market.” We fundamentally disagree. Our aim is not to see everything, but rather to see what is worth seeing, placing emphasis on quality rather than quantity.

Human nature itself teaches us this. Our senses constantly filter what we hear; otherwise life would be unbearable. When this filtering mechanism fails, it is known as Auditory Processing Disorder (APD) — a condition in which the ears receive sound correctly, but the brain struggles to filter and organize it. Every sound arrives with equal weight, making it difficult to distinguish the voice that truly matters.

Business is not very different. Hearing everything does not necessarily lead to better decisions.

In fact, one might ask: is hearing “everything” truly a virtue? Or does it resemble the fate of the Anatolian King Midas, whose wish that everything he touched turn to gold was granted — only for him to discover that such abundance could become a curse?

As we strive to build a global brand from Turkey, we try to follow the wisdom that has emerged from Anatolia over thousands of years. Many of its teachings point to the same truth. Mevlana (Rumi) reminds us: “The essence of truth is brief.”

This heritage teaches us something simple: the ear may hear everything, but wisdom lies in choosing what is worth listening to.

Let us consider a few practical examples.

Noise, Focus, Value

There is absolutely no value in receiving enquiries involving sanctioned vessels or sanctioned cargoes. Of course we conduct the necessary compliance checks and reject such enquiries, but the process still consumes time and resources. A single compliance review may take around fifteen minutes (sometimes lot more). Over the course of a year, assuming 220 working days, this amounts to 3,300 minutes — 55 hours. In other words, more than two full  days (7 working days) spent processing enquiries that should never have reached our desk in the first place.

Another example concerns poorly managed vessels where crews live in unacceptable conditions — sometimes unpaid for months, sometimes effectively stranded on their ships. Our terms and conditions address this explicitly. We do not wish to become silent partners in such practices by facilitating the trade that sustains them. Our hope is that such vessels find no suppliers at all, and that this form of exploitation comes to an end.

Then there are enquiries that spread everywhere across the market. A single vessel may circulate simultaneously through a dozen traders. This clearly demonstrates that the end user is focused solely on extracting the lowest possible price through a dog-eat-dog margin war.

Imagine working on the same vessel through twelve different intermediaries. Even if we spend only fifteen minutes reviewing each approach, that amounts to 180 minutes — three hours for a single enquiry. Over 220 working days, this becomes 39,600 minutes, or 660 hours — more than 27 full days (83 days of work). And after all that effort, the probability of actually fixing the business may be only a few percent.

Spending over 90 days of work for a tiny piece of gold dust? This is desperation.

Often these enquiries drift further — moving between ports or dates — multiplying the wasted effort.

When the same enquiry circulates through multiple sources, suppliers sometimes end up competing against their own price. Each round of negotiation pushes the price lower, as traders return requesting further reductions based on indications they claim to have received elsewhere. What begins as normal commercial negotiation can easily turn into a downward spiral.

Even when other suppliers have already stepped away, the bidding war may continue simply because the enquiry keeps circulating through different intermediaries. In such cases the market ceases to function as a place of genuine price discovery and instead becomes an echo chamber of continuously lowered offers.

Occasionally the process reaches an even more curious stage: a trader fixes the business at an unrealistic price and later returns asking the supplier for a revision — effectively expecting the supplier to absorb the consequences of a deal concluded below sustainable levels.

There is an old Anatolian saying: “The wolf that turns to every barking dog will never catch its prey.”

In markets overwhelmed by noise, the same principle applies. Those who react to every signal risk losing sight of what truly matters.

Discipline, Trust, Integrity

At Suzun, business sustainability is not a slogan; it is a guiding principle.

There are also intermediaries that operate as what we sometimes call “Me Too Enterprises SA” — a desk, an offshore company, a phone, and perhaps a few “good clients,” sometimes supported by questionable financial arrangements or opaque relationships with buyers.

Suzun, by contrast, is part of a family business established sixty years ago. It has grown through honest work, discipline, and carefully managed risk. We simply do not have capital to waste on transactions that lack transparency, integrity, or professionalism. We are not a thrill-seeking vulture fund chasing short-term gains; our business is aligned with generations of sustainable trading.

We take credit risk extremely seriously. For this reason, the panel of ten traders we work with consists of financially robust companies. Their exposures can be credit-insured, and they either maintain proper credit functions of their own or possess deep market knowledge built over decades of experience in their segments.

In today’s markets, where prices are sailing above $1,000 per tonne, credit risk and liquidity are very real concerns.

For these reasons, we have chosen a different path. Rather than trying to hear everything in the market, we focus on what is worth hearing — working with a limited number of trusted partners who share our standards of compliance, professionalism, and long-term thinking. Among them are companies such as Peninsula Petroleum and Alpha Trading, to name just two examples. Our panel includes a balanced mix of top-tier players, medium-sized houses, and traders specialised in smaller accounts — much like the fingers of a hand: different in size and reach, yet each essential to forming a robust and reliable grip.

Instead of spending minutes, hours, and days chasing unproductive enquiries, we prefer to invest that time in creating value for our stakeholders. We prefer to originate new opportunities for our selected partners. We prefer to allow our employees to engage in charitable initiatives.

And sometimes, when the alternative is pursuing a bad deal, we would rather our people simply do nothing at all — because even that can be healthier than chasing noise.

In business, as in life, the ability to filter noise is not a weakness. It is judgment.

Our focus is therefore very simple: To work closely with a small number of trusted partners, where clarity, unity, and the quality of cooperation matter more than the sheer volume of market noise.

As our Chairman of the Board, Selçuk Mehmet Uzun, often says:

“In a market where suppliers are replaced for a difference of one dollar, the real success is to be the preferred choice.”