Fresh from placing a landmark order for the world’s biggest cement carrier, Nova Marine Carriers has upped the ante in its fleet modernisation.
The Ticino, Switzerland-based company said it has sold a quartet of handysize bulkers built about a decade ago, replacing them with three larger, more modern Japanese-built handysizes it has agreed to acquire.
Chief executive Vincenzo Romeo said: “Especially for larger ships … the choice is for superior technological quality, guaranteed in this case by Japanese shipyards that specialised themselves in design and construction of this type of vessel during the last decades.”
The company did not give any price details on the ships it bought and sold.
Only one of the trio it acquired can be clearly identified — the 39,200-dwt Atlantic Prism (built 2019), which is already trading under its new name, Sider Miramare.
As for the other two ships, Nova Marine revealed them only under their new names, which cannot be found in shipping data banks yet.
These are the 40,300-dwt, ammonia-ready Sider Imabari (built 2024), which was delivered earlier this year by Shimanami Shipyard; and the Onomichi Dockyard-built 37,200-dwt Bolten Harmony (built 2020).
Broking sources are identifying the future Sider Imabari as Grindrod Shipping’s HB Imabari, which brokers reported as sold this week to undisclosed buyers for $35.4m.
As for the Bolten Harmony, market sources believe it is the Orix Maritime-owned Perseus Harmony — a vessel built at Saiki Heavy Industries to an Onomichi design.
Buyers from Greece to Singapore
More clarity exists about the four older, Chinese-built ships that Nova Marine has sold.
The company again did not identify their buyers or prices, but these can be reconstructed with the help of databases and past broker reports.
Nova Marine’s 37,400-dwt Carlota Bolten (built 2015), for instance, was already reported sold to unidentified buyers in April for $18.8m.
It is now trading as Carla C in the fleet of Greece’s Cosmoship Management, led by Nick Savvas.
The sale of the 37,600-dwt Carolina Bolten (built 2015) probably took place a bit later, at the end of June, for about $18.5m.
It has been trading since July as UBC Thessaloniki with Hartmann company United Bulk Carriers Cyprus.
The 39,200-dwt Sider Eva Maria (built 2014) changed hands in June as well, for about $21m, and belongs to Singapore’s Alpha Omega Marine, trading as One and Only.
No information is available about the likely price and buyer of the fourth ship sold, the 36,100-dwt Amorgos Bolten (built 2014).
A busy and canny asset player in the secondhand markets, Nova Marine claims to own and operate more than 100 bulkers, general cargo ships and cement carriers and to be involved in 18 joint ventures.
One of them is a NovaAlgoma Cement Carriers, a cooperation with Canada’s Algoma Central Corp, which claimed last month to have ordered in China what will be the world’s largest cement carrier.
Nova Marine is controlled by the Romeo and Gozzi families.
