The opening of the new oil pipeline from Baku to Ceyhan at the Mediterranean Sea in 2005 opened up new opportunities for marketing crude oil from Azerbaijan. When SOCAR Trading, a trading arm of SOCAR, short for the State Oil and Gas Company of the Republic of Azerbaijan, started operation in 2008 with the clear mission to market crude oil, a success story unfolded that is still going from strength to strength today. SOCAR Trading SA has become one of the leading trading houses for light crude oil and has recently stepped in gas and power projects.