A livestock carrier considered abandoned by an Australian court has been sold for $6m at auction.
A notice from the Admiralty Court in Australia shows the 11,670-gt Yangtze Fortune (built 2005) has gone to an unnamed buyer in a case brought by Dan-Bunkering, a Danish-owned fuel supplier.
The sale cash, plus $232,000 and AUD 128,000 ($85,000) for a bunker adjustment, has been paid into court to settle claims.
A decision on the priority of these will not be made before 19 April.
The Soar Harmony Shipping-owned carrier was arrested by creditors in Portland, Victoria, where it has been stuck since the end of September 2022 after its crew reported a crack in the hull.
The vessel had arrived from China to load 5,200 animals.
The Yangtze Fortune was auctioned via a sealed tender carried out by Sydney-based Australian Independent Shipbrokers on 10 February.
Court documents indicated that Apollo Marine & Offshore Services, a Hong Kong-registered entity, submitted an $8.5m bid for the Yangtze Fortune.
But the company was unable to submit the 10% deposit within the required five days, citing “investor delays”.
Second-highest bidder?
The sale was cancelled and the court ordered that the livestock carrier be sold to the second-highest bidder.
The sister ship Yangtze Harmony (built 2004) is also to be auctioned by a court in Singapore.
Both vessels were converted from container vessels in 2017 by Sinomarine Livestock Carriers, a joint venture between Sinotrans and CSC.
They were used to launch an export trade of live cows from Australia to China.
Soar Harmony later assumed ownership of the pair and ran into financial troubles that eventually led to their arrests.
