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(Bloomberg) -- Gunvor Group is renewing its leadership team after taking some hits in crude oil trading last year including a bullish North Sea play that went wrong, according to Chief Executive Officer Torbjörn Törnqvist.

The shake-up at Gunvor is the latest sign that a boom period for commodity traders over the past few years is giving way to a more mixed environment, where range-bound oil markets in particular are hitting profits for traders who thrive on volatility. Still, profits across the industry continue to be higher than before the coronavirus pandemic and the invasion of Ukraine supercharged earnings.

Törnqvist said in an interview that Gunvor’s profits in the second half of 2024 had been lower than the first half, but that the full-year result would still be one of the four or five best in the company’s history. Gunvor’s crude oil trading had been profitable, he said, but “there were some aspects of our crude oil trading that did not do what they should do, so it’s normal we adjust.”

Gunvor, a private company majority-owned by Törnqvist, is due to report its 2024 results to bondholders in the coming weeks. First-half profits were $417 million, down around 48% from a year earlier.

Several senior trading executives have left Gunvor in recent months, including most recently co-head of trading Stephane Degenne, Bloomberg reported this week. Other recent departures include head of crude trading Benoit Roulon.

Törnqvist said the people who were leaving were doing so “on very good terms with the company.”

“It’s a reset and setting the course for the future,” he said. The company is also making new hires, such as Gary Pedersen, who recently joined from Millennium Management LLC as president and CEO of Americas.

Gunvor raised eyebrows in the North Sea crude market last summer by bidding up grades of crude that make up the key Dated Brent benchmark.

Törnqvist said the bullish North Sea play “didn’t go according to plan.” Asked what the plan had been, he replied: “To make money.”

He highlighted Gunvor’s North American oil-trading business as an area of strength, saying the company was one of the largest exporters of crude from the US. He said that an $800 million deal to finance the government of Gabon’s purchase of oil producer Assala Energy from Carlyle Group had been “one of the good stories” for Gunvor.

“Some areas have really performed well; some areas did not perform well. I’m open with that,” he said.

Price Outlook

Törnqvist echoed a bearish consensus on the outlook for oil prices, arguing that one of the main bullish risks — the potential for tougher US sanctions on Iran — may not come to pass. US President Donald Trump’s desire to see lower oil prices will probably outweigh any push to restrict Iran’s oil exports, he said.

“If he says we are going to kill exports, I guarantee you one week from now you see $80-plus,” Törnqvist said, referring to Trump. “Then he will say, ‘Ah...’”

“He does not want to see $80,” the CEO said. “I think he wants to see $60.”

The CEO said that the gas market would be more volatile than oil. In the US, he predicted that prices would not return to the lows of last year. Gunvor bought “relatively significant” gas production assets last year, he said, declining to identify them as the deal has not been publicly announced.

In the global gas market, he said that current prices were already hitting demand in price-sensitive countries like Pakistan and Egypt. An end to the war between Russia and Ukraine could lead to a resumption of Russian gas flows through Ukraine, he said, though he cautioned that achieving a peace deal may be harder than Trump appears to believe.

Gunvor, which grew into a global commodity trader from a start focused on Russian oil, still owns a minority share in the Ust-Luga terminal in Russia, although it hasn’t been able to access its dividends due to financial restrictions since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Törnqvist said the company would be ready to resume trading Russian commodities if western sanctions allowed. “If sanctions are eased in a way that we can go back in, why wouldn’t we? It’s our job.”

(Updates with more from interview)