Pankaj Khanna, chief executive of ship manager Heidmar, is seeing something different in tanker markets buoyed by positive fundamentals.
He told a Capital Link conference in London that the vessel supply side of the economic equation is not quite like anything seen in previous years.
Industry observers have been saying for 50 years that fossil fuels will go into “perennial decline”, the CEO said. “We have never seen that so far.”
On the demand side, Khanna cannot see anything negative, despite the high interest-rate environment.
But he added: “I think we are seeing something on the supply side, which is slightly different than what we have seen in the past.
“In the past, if we were in markets like we are right now, the shipowners would be running to the yards and ordering ships like crazy. But we are not seeing that.”
The crude orderbook stands at just under 4% of the existing fleet and for product carriers the figure is 9%, meaning probably record low fleet growth, the CEO said.
“So the supply side is not a huge concern, especially in an environment where yard prices are very high,” Khanna argued.
“If you go to a yard today, you probably get a VLCC in 2026 for maybe $125m to $130m. The uncertainty about that is of course the fuel.”
Khanna said it was very unusual to see an orderbook of only 18 vessels.
Thin schedule
“We have about four vessels left for delivery this year and I count only one vessel for 2024,” the Heidmar boss said, adding he has never seen this before in his career.
Two of the 2023 ships are going to AET in Malaysia and one to Adnoc Logistics & Services, all being built by Hanwha Ocean in South Korea.
The fourth VLCC is one of unknown ownership for delivery from Japan.
And the same goes for the 2024 delivery, which is being built at Japan Marine United. Only two more are set for 2025 handovers.
“We see markets which can be sustained at least for a couple of years,” Khanna said.
“What we really need in the market now is sentiment. We are talking into the winter months and I see that if the weather is normal, not even a very cold winter, but a normal winter, I think we will get the sentiment, push the markets back up.”
