Eagle Bulk Shipping confirmed acquiring a secondhand ultramax bulker for $27.5m on Tuesday, a week after TradeWinds reported the sale.
TradeWinds reported on 6 September that the Gary Vogel-led owner of ultramaxes and supramaxes had bought a seven-year-old ultramax for less than $28m from Ultrabulk of Denmark.
Eagle Bulk declined to comment on reports of the sale at the time but then said on Tuesday that it had bought a vessel of those characteristics for the same price.
The New York-listed shipowner said the vessel will be renamed Tokyo Eagle and be delivered to Eagle Bulk during the fourth quarter of this year.
Ultrabulk’s scrubber-fitted 62,100-dwt Ultra Trust (built 2015), the Imabari Shipbuilding of Japan, has an estimated market value of $28.3m, according to VesselsValue.
The acquisition marks Eagle Bulk’s first vessel purchase since June 2021 and suggests the shipowner bought it when values were 10% to 15% lower than the early-summer apex, as TradeWinds previously reported.
The average market price for a comparable 63,000-dwt vessel built 10 years ago has fallen 10.8% since late May and most of June to $37m during the week of 9 September, according to Clarksons Research.
Wall Street analysts agreed.
“The price reflects a moderate pullback in values in recent months, with this deal representing roughly a 10% decline from the peak in secondhand market values this past spring,” Jefferies analyst Omar Nokta wrote in a note on Tuesday.
