CREA analysts counted 107 tankers that changed their flag to Russian over the period, raising the number of such vessels in the Russian ship registry from 280 to 382.
Registrations peaked in December 2025, when 25 new entries were added in a single month. The spike coincided with a US campaign against Venezuelan oil and threats to detain oil tankers, as some vessels began seeking protection under the Russian flag.
At the time of the flag change, 93 of the 107 tankers (87%) were already under sanctions. According to CREA, 90 vessels were subject to restrictions imposed by more than one jurisdiction. Before moving to Russian jurisdiction, more than half of them had sailed under false flags.
Vessels flying Russian flags (72 of the 107 were counted) placed roughly 7.5 billion euros' worth of oil and oil products on world markets. Oil worth 5.2 billion euros went primarily to China. Ship-to-ship transfer schemes in Egypt and the Red Sea were also used.
Analysts link the rise in registrations to sanctions pressure on open registries. The company managing the registration of the "shadow fleet" in the Comoros and Gambia came under European sanctions in the summer of 2025. Both states subsequently reduced the number of tankers they registered. Panama cut the number of "shadow fleet" vessels in its registries by almost two-thirds from May 2025. Barbados and Palau cleared sanctioned vessels from their registries entirely.
According to The Bell, the Russian registry has been adding two to three vessels in recent months. The slowdown in re-registration stems from Russia finding an alternative in the registry of Equatorial Guinea, where 50 vessels have been registered this year with seaworthiness certificates from the Russian Maritime Register of Shipping. Windward shipping analyst Michelle Wiese Bockmann also attributes it to the explosion aboard the tanker Caroline Bezengi, which had Russian insurance coverage, off the coast of Oman in June.
Among the factors behind the decline in registrations, CREA cites the case of the gas carrier Arctic Metagaz. In March the vessel was holed in the Mediterranean after an attack by drones of Ukrainian sabotage groups and left adrift. Abandoned by its crew, the ship drifted for a month and a half, posing a threat to shipping. Libya, Malta and Italy had to deal with the crisis on their own. Arctic Metagaz has been under US and UK sanctions since 2024; the vessel was used to carry LNG from the Arctic LNG-2 terminal to the Chinese port of Beihai.
In the view of CREA analyst Luke Wickenden, the Arctic Metagaz incident showed that the Russian flag is a shield for dangerous vessels that offers no support in the event of a catastrophe. CREA proposes stepping up inspections of Russian vessels in the Baltic and the Mediterranean.