Price declines for midsize to large bulk carriers are encouraging buyers to grab such tonnage, despite analysts’ concerns that secondhand values are still too high for what these ships are earning in freight markets.
Deal-making appetite often emerges when buyers find the opportunity to get their hands on ships they already know.
The most characteristic example is Greece’s W Marine, which for a second time this year turned to Germany’s AO Shipping to buy a Chinese-built kamsarmax.
The Athens-based company has agreed to spend close to $18m on the 81,700-dwt Belo Horizonte (built 2012), market sources said.
The amount includes an ongoing time charter at $14,500 per day. This, however, does not affect the price much as the ship’s employment will expire at the end of the year — just a few weeks after joining W Marine’s fleet.
The main driver behind the deal is that W Marine already has such vessels in its growing bulker fleet, which has now reached 16 panamaxes, kamsarmaxes and post-panamaxes.
The company spent in March a much higher $19.8m to buy a sister ship to the Belo Horizonte — the 81,700-dwt Blumenau (renamed W Emerald, built 2012) — again from AO Shipping.
Satisfied with the performance of the Blumenau and finding the Belo Horizonte in similarly good condition, W Marine likely considered the opportunity to buy a similar vessel at a lower price as too good to miss.
Yiannis Sarantitis-founded and Nikos Triantafyllakis-led W Marine bets on economic growth around the rim of the Indian Ocean to fuel earnings of its post-panamax, kamsarmax and panamax vessels.
When buying the Blumenau in March, Triantafyllakis said that W Marine was “open to increasing [the company’s] exposure with good-value vessels in our core sector”.
Other Greek companies are in expansion mode as well.
As TradeWinds reported on 23 August, US-listed behemoth Navios Maritime Partners disclosed spending $28m on the 81,700-dwt Navios Horizon I (built 2019) — a Japanese-owned kamsarmax it already had in its fleet as a chartered-in vessel.
A similar deal may be in the works for the 82,200-dwt Navios Southern Star (built 2013), a ship owned by Japan’s Marubeni Corp and managed by a privately held company of Navios owner Angeliki Frangou.
Athens brokers report the Japanese-built vessel as sold to unidentified Greek interests for $21.5m.
In yet another kamsarmax deal, Malaysian Bulk Carriers is reportedly parting ways with the 82,100-dwt Alam Kekal (built 2018) for a price above $30m.
If confirmed, the deal would leave Malaysian Bulk Carriers, a publicly held company backed by shipowner Robert Kuok, with a single ship in its fleet: the slightly younger, 85,000-dwt Alam Kuasa (built 2019).
The decline of secondhand values seems to be fuelling some deals for slightly smaller bulkers as well.
According to some Athens brokers, Far Eastern interests are spending $20.4m on Nissin Shipping’s 63,800-dwt ultramax Hanton Trader III (built 2014). The same vessel was again reported sold about two months ago at a much higher price of $23.6m.
A slightly younger ultramax, the 63,500-dwt SSI Formidable (built 2017), is changing hands as well.
Tayfun Gunerhan-led Densay Shipping, which has embarked on a large-scale expansion of ultramax newbuildings, is shedding the Chinese-built vessel to Greeks for about $27m, London brokers said.
Moving lower in carrying capacity to supramaxes and in an all-Greek deal, unidentified players are said to be spending $18.2m on the 56,100-dwt Pythagoras (built 2012).
This is the smallest and oldest of the five bulkers owned by traditional Hellenic owner Samos Steamship.
Just as Densay, Samos has been expanding its fleet with newbuidings recently and making space for them by selling its older vessels.
TradeWinds reported in July on the Athens-based company divesting the 203,300-dwt Stamatis (built 2004) to Far Eastern buyers for a price in the low $18m.
The ship has since emerged with serial capesize and newcastlemax buyer Winning Shipping and is now trading under its new name of Sunny Kankan.
