Navios Maritime Partners is poised to potentially become the fourth Greek shipping company this month to sell its oldest bulker.
US brokers report that the New York-listed behemoth and owner of about 140 vessels is getting $9.2m from divesting the 76,600-dwt Navios Orbiter (built 2004) to undisclosed buyers.
The deal, which has yet to be officially confirmed, comes hot on the heels of a similar transaction in December, in which the Angeliki Frangou-led company sold the 75,700-dwt Navios Hyperion (renamed Hoanh Son Jupiter, built 2004) for about $9m to Vietnam’s Hoanh Son Group.
Frangou offloaded both the Navios Hyperion and Navios Orbiter just a few weeks before the ships were scheduled to pass their special survey and just a few weeks after the end of their agreed employment.
The Navios Orbiter was on an index-linked time charter that expired in December.
If its sale is confirmed, it would become the 24th bulker, tanker or container ship that Frangou has sold since the summer of 2022 when she formed Navios Partners by incorporating the fleets of former affiliates Navios Holdings, Navios Maritime Containers and Navios Maritime Acquisition.
A potential Navios Orbiter deal would align with the recent trend of Greek owners — Diana Shipping, Alpha Bulkers and Titan Maritime — selling vintage panamaxes.
Such transactions are facilitated by the busy dealmaking mood in the secondhand market, despite fast approaching Chinese New Year festivities during which activity usually dies down.
“Even though things are simmering down for Chinese New Year, the lead-up to the hiatus is seemingly having less of a slowing effect on S&P than it may be having on chartering,” Doric Shipbrokers said in their latest weekly note.
Price developments are conducive to deals as well.
“While prices aren’t really falling, they are at least stable and not firming much,” Athens-based Doric added.
Greeks and Turks united in buying
When it comes to middle-aged ships, Greek owners are firmly on the buying side of the fence — as are Turkish ones.
Several brokers in London, Greece and the UK are linking unidentified Hellenic and Turkish interests to a string of deals for midsize vessels built between 2007 and 2014.
The most eye-catching among them is a $22m transaction in which Greek interests are swooping on a Japanese-held, Japanese-built and eco-engine fitted supramax — the 55,900-dwt King Baton Rouge (built 2014).
Two supramaxes of about the same age not fitted with modern eco engines, by contrast, have fetched much lower prices.
Greek buyers are said to have spent $16m on Golden Ocean’s 56,600-dwt Sea Star (built 2014) and $18.5m on Far East Shipping’s 56,000-dwt Tomorrow (built 2013).
Greek interests have also been tied to a $15.45m sale by Germany’s Oldendorff Carriers of the scrubber-fitted, 93,300-dwt post-panamax Charlotte Oldendorff (built 2010).
Turkish buyers, meanwhile, are being linked to deals for handysizes.
Undisclosed Bosphorus players are said to have spent between $12.3m and $12.5m on the Nordic Hamburg-managed, 34,900-dwt Nordic London (built 2010).
Other Turks reportedly acquired the Chinese-owned, 37,100-dwt Rui Fu Xing (built 2012) for $16.5m.
They are also suspected behind Grindrod’s confirmed $10.4m sale to undisclosed buyers of the 32,600-dwt IVS Kingbird (built 2007).
