Fewer oil tankers are being used to store crude than traders and shipbrokers had expected at the start of the year, as a recent run-up in oil prices upended a popular trading strategy. “There were around 25 to 30 large tankers taken last month, but only around 10 of these are being used for oil storage now,” a Singapore-based shipbroker said, citing industry data. Many market watchers had expected big commodity-trading firms to capitalize on the price gap between different oil-futures contracts by buying physical barrels, storing them on ships and locking in profits by selling futures contracts for delivery further out in the future. When the price of Brent crude, the global benchmark, sank below $50 a barrel in mid-January, its price for delivery in January 2016 […]