Greek container tonnage provider Contships Management is profiting from the strong container ship market with further vessel sales and a pair of lucrative charters.
The Nikolas Pateras-controlled company is selling the 966-teu Contship Fun (built 2006) and Contship Sun (built 2007).
The vessels are being sold en bloc for $16.5m to a Greek buyer with charters attached, according to shipbroking sources.
The deal comes hard on the heels of the sale by Contships of five older feeder vessels while the company is also planning to sell another four vessels.
The price for the two 900-teu feeder ships points to a doubling in value since the Contship Sun was bought in 2016.
The Contship Sun has been sold with the balance of a 12-month charter with French liner CMA CGM at $11,500 per day, brokers said.
Besides the two vessel sales, Contship has tied up other strong fixtures in the charter market.
The Athens-based company has fixed the 1,118-teu Contship Sky and Contship Win (both built 2008) at improved rates.
The Contship Sky is reported fixed for a year with CMA CGM at $14,000 per day.
That reflects rising demand for geared tonnage as the rate is about $1,000 per day higher than a sister ship obtained last month, according to brokers.
Separately, the Contship Win has been taken for four to six months at $13,000 per day by Danish liner operator AP Moller-Maersk.
Sold to Medkon
The deals follow the recent sale by Contships of the first in a series of nine feeder container ships.
The first five in the series of 18-year-old ships between 900-teu and 1,120-teu were sold in early October for about $37.5m en bloc.
The vessels have been sold to Turkish operator Medkon Lines.
They comprise the 966-teu Contship Ana, Contship Max and Contship Pep, the 990-teu Contship Quo and the 1,118-teu Contship Bee (all built 2006).
Contships also plans to sell another four vessels of the same age.
These comprise the 1,118-teu Contship Air, 1,116-teu Contship Lex, 1,100-teu Contship Med and 1,098-teu Contship Don (all built 2006).
Since then, his company has reinvested the proceeds from the sales into acquiring a larger, younger feeder ship.
Contships recently acquired the 1,500-teu Warnow Boatswain (built 2012) from the fleet of Cyprus-based Marlow Navigation.
Pateras is known as an astute dealmaker in the sale and purchase market.
Ever since founding Contships about a decade ago, he has bought 59 feeder ships on the secondhand market.
Fifty of these acquisitions came from German owners, or their bankers, selling ships at very attractive prices.
The Contships fleet, averaging 15 years in age, handles 1.5m containers across 4,800 port calls annually.
The company Pateras built from scratch in 2015 has become the world’s largest independent player with a fleet of 47 ships.
