A handymax bulker owned by Chinese trader Wanpeng International was briefly held under arrest in Singapore this week at the request of a timber company.
Zhangjiagang Heyixing Timber Co successfully petitioned the High Court of Singapore to issue an arrest warrant for the 47,200-dwt bulker Prosperity 102 (built 1997) after filing an SGD 285,000 ($212,740) cargo claim alleging damages to timber carried on the vessel.
Court records show that another Chinese timber company, Duchang Nanxin Timber Co, filed a caveat against the Prosperity 102’s arrest, but this was subsequently withdrawn.
Wanpeng moved quickly to secure the release of its ship, which had its arrest lifted on Friday, three days after it was first seized.
Wanpeng acquired the Prosperity 102 as the Genco Wisdom in December 2016 via Hong Kong-registered single-ship entity Milo Shipping, its official owner. The company paid $3.2m for the ship, a figure that today is slightly less than its $3.7m scrap value as estimated by VesselsValue.
The online platform pegs a similar value on the ship as a trading vessel.
The Prosperity 102 is one of two ships with Chinese links that have recently been arrested in Singapore over a very small claim amount.
The 6,400-dwt product tanker ES Right (built 2010), a vessel owned by a Hong Kong-registered entity affiliated with Shanghai-based Yonghuan Shipping, continues to languish in an anchorage off the city-state since being seized on 2 January.
Two marine services companies — one from Hong Kong and the other from China — arrested the tanker after lodging a joint claim of $607,000.
