Hiring a supramax bulker in the spot market will currently cost you at least a couple of thousand dollars per day more than a larger panamax.
Clarksons attributed the unusual price premium to more supramax grain cargoes in key origin regions and higher congestion levels for the vessel segment.
Data from Oceanbolt identifies 226 supramaxes caught in congestion, which has fallen by around 40 vessels since the beginning of August.
However, average waiting times have grown to 16.43 days, five days longer than at the beginning of the month.
Things are better for panamaxes.
The bulker tracking platform shows 149 congested panamaxes, waiting for 6.73 days on average.
The discount for panamaxes comes even though they are responsible for carrying the biggest proportion of grain shipped during August to date.
Oceanbolt has tracked loadings for 14.9m tonnes of grains on board panamaxes this month, compared with 9.1m tonnes on board supramaxes. Handysizes have taken 7.6m tonnes.
The top grain export region for supramaxes in August has been the US, which has shipped 3.2m tonnes, followed by Brazil (2m tonnes).
For panamaxes, Brazil has been by far the biggest generator of vessel demand, exporting 9.3m tonnes. Most has been bound for Asia.
Spot check
Baltic Exchange panellists assessed the weighted average spot rate for 58,000-dwt supramaxes across 10 benchmark routes at $14,474 per day on Wednesday, just $9 less than on Tuesday.
Average spot rates for larger ultramaxes of 63,000 dwt were assessed at $16,608 per day, down by $8 since Tuesday.
Both assessments are way above current estimates for panamaxes, which are based on a 82,500-dwt kamsarmax vessel.
Panellists cut $278 from their assessment of average panamax spot rates across five key routes, which they estimated at $12,154 per day on Wednesday.
