Our new report, “Glasgow shipping firm’s LNG cargoes paid £127m into Russia’s war chest”, shows how a British shipping firm “Seapeak” transported gas cargoes, which contributed an estimated £127m (€150m / $162m) in taxes to the Russian state last year.
Seapeak Maritime (Glasgow) Ltd manages seven tankers which ferry liquified natural gas (LNG) from Russia’s enormous Yamal plant in north western Siberia to the rest of the world. The company has faced criticism for complicity with the Putin regime after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
But Razom We Stand’s analysis shows that Seapeak has ignored that criticism and continued to ship Russian LNG in massive quantities. Last year, the firm’s tanker fleet lifted 7.56 million tonnes of LNG from the Yamal terminal, according to data from the commodity analysis firm Kpler. That’s more than one-third of all Yamal LNG’s exports that year.
Razom We Stand estimates that cargo to be valued at £2.9bn (€3.44bn / $3.72bn), based on average prices for Russian LNG throughout 2024. Based on Russia’s corporate income tax, which applies a regional tax and a federal surcharge, Razom We Stand estimates that these cargoes contributed around £127m (€150m / $162m) to the Russian budget in 2024, including roughly £71m (€84m / $91m) to the federal treasury and £56m (€66m / $71m) to the regional Yamal-Nenets budget.
The £71m (€84m / $91m) paid to the federal treasury in 2024 could have covered the cost of 2700 Shahed drones or 45 Iskander-M type missiles, which Russia continuously uses to attack civilians in Ukraine.
Gas exports are a critical lifeline for the Putin regime, earning billions of pounds. They have become more crucial still during Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin was forced to raise the federal portion of corporate income tax on LNG exporters from 3% to 17% in 2023, as Western countries imposed sanctions on the Russian economy.
Most of Seapeak’s cargoes were destined for EU ports, with the bulk of the gas being sold under long-term contracts to entities including Germany’s SEFE Marketing and Spain’s Naturgy.
