Tim Mendelssohn, managing director and co-founder of Spark Commodities, believes the liquefied natural gas (LNG) trade needs more options to manage risk as the market continues to evolve and more players buy and sell the super-chilled fuel. 

He launched Spark in early 2019 along with Charles Vallantin Dulac with the backing of commodity data and analytics firm Kpler and the European Energy Exchange. Spark offers various data and features on its platform, but its LNG freight index is at the core of its business and has gained traction in the global market as an alternative to assessments from the nearly 300-year-old Baltic Exchange. 

Spark won a major listing with Intercontinental Exchange Inc. (ICE) earlier this year, which launched freight futures contracts based on Spark’s...