Noble Chartering, the shipping arm of the restructured Noble Group, could soon be down to three directly owned ships as yet another post-panamax bulker sales deal looks set to be concluded soon.
Michael Nagler, Noble Chartering’s Singapore-based chief executive, told TradeWinds on Monday that a deal to sell the 93,000-dwt bulker Ocean Topaz (built 2013) is currently in the works.
Nagler did not identify the potential buyer, although some broking sources suggested it is a Chinese company.
VesselsValue lists a ship with the Ocean Topaz's characteristics as being worth $17m — a figure that Singapore broking sources said is accurate.
The deal comes hot on the heels of Noble selling the 93,000-dwt Ocean Ruby (built 2010) to Oldendorff Carriers for $13.2m.
Remaining ships up for sale
The two transactions leave Noble with three bulkers in its owned fleet. Those vessels — the 93,000-dwt Ocean Garnet (built 2010) and Ocean Sapphire (built 2012), along with the 180,000-dwt Aqua Vision (built 2011) — are all on the sales block.
Nagler stressed that the decision to sell the ships was made two years ago as part of an overall asset-light shipping policy focused on covering the commodities trader’s shipping requirements through short and long-term charters.
A total of 11 ships have been sold since then.
“We don’t want to sell them off in one go," Nagler said. "We sell when the price is right.”
He dismissed any suggestion that the vessel sales meant Noble was withdrawing entirely from shipping.
“Going forward, we will expand our time-charter fleet, which will replace the ships we have sold," Nagler said. "I’d like to make it very clear that we are not exiting shipping.”
Third-party cargo portfolio
Noble currently operates a fleet of 38 bulkers ranging in size from supramax to capesize. During the first five months of this year, it lifted eight million tonnes of cargo, primarily coal, iron ore and grain.
While Noble has been responsible for moving in-house cargoes, it has been building up a growing third-party cargo portfolio for several years. Third-party cargoes account for two-thirds of the cargo it has moved this year, up from 60% last year.
Also aggressively expanding with third-party clients is Omega Management, a shipmanagement company originally formed to handle the technical management of Noble’s owned ships.
Omega, which Nagler also heads, offers a full spectrum of commercial and technical management services for bulkers and tankers owned by banks and other shipowners. The company manages five third-party vessels, with a target of running 20 ships by the end of this year.
