Goldenport Shipmanagement has taken advantage of Eastern Pacific Shipping’s sell-off of smaller vessels for its first bulker sale-and-purchase play of 2020.
The Greek company spent $16.2m to acquire the 61,500-dwt Devongate (built 2014), according to sources close to Eastern Pacific in Singapore.
It becomes the second ultramax in Goldenport’s fleet of 13 bulkers. A third ultramax, the 63,800-dwt newbuilding GW Mathilde, is scheduled to be delivered by Cosco Shipping Heavy Industry Yangzhou this month.
Goldenport’s last S&P move occurred last September, when it acquired a handysize containership from Shoei Kisen of Japan.
On the sales front, it sold a sub-panamax containership to Indian shiprecyclers in June.
The Devongate adds to a growing tally of purchases that have seen Greece’s shipowners take the top spot as the biggest single players in the S&P market for bulkers.
Greek buyers have accounted for 31% of all confirmed acquisitions this year, according to Athens shipbroker Intermodal.
This week has also seen Greek owner Michael Bodouroglou's private company Allseas Marine buy the 57,000-dwt supramaxes Ithomi and Parnon (both built 2011) from Delta International in an en-bloc deal for about $15.5m.
They are Bodouroglou’s first bulker purchases in five years.
Goldenport was able to take advantage of Eastern Pacific’s recent strategy to exit the smaller bulker segments and focus on the larger size ranges.
Eastern Pacific sold the 53,500-dwt Bridgegate (built 2010) to SR Shipping of Bangladesh in March and followed this up in May with the sale of the 61,000-dwt Divinegate (built 2019) to Japanese interests.
The company is described as being very open to selling other ships, but is not in any rush to do so unless it receives what it deems to be a good offer.
