Arne Blystad's Songa Box has sold one of the vessels from its buyout of the Vroon container ship fleet.
The 1,118-teu Songa Lynx (built 2006) changed hands in a deal dated 3 December by brokers. VesselsValue estimates the ship's market value to be $18m.
Under the name Ionian Express, the vessel was the oldest of a six-ship fleet that Songa Box bought from Dutch shipowner Vroon in October.
Songa Box chief executive Frederik Platou would not comment on the sale or name the buyer or price, but implied that Songa Box is not about to flip all of the Vroon ships.
"We continue to have an optimistic outlook for a firm container ship market into 2022," he said.
Platou said Songa Box has a flexible strategy for vessel sales and charters.
"We will be pragmatic on developments in the market," he said.
The Blystad organisation has already been pretty flexible this year.
In June, Blystad and fellow shareholders Tom Erik Klaveness and Magnus Roth made waves by selling the former Blystad-led boxship venture Songa Container with its 11-ship fleet to Oslo neighbour MPC Container Ships for $210m in cash and shares.
But before that deal was done, Blystad had already quietly started over again in container ships, having incorporated a new vehicle called Songa Box ahead of the sale of Songa Container.
Since then, Songa Box has grown first with one-off secondhand purchases, then a two-ship newbuilding order, and most recently in October with the purchase that took Vroon out of the boxship business.
The price on that transaction, like many in which Blystad is involved, remains undisclosed. VesselsValue reckoned at the time that the six ships were worth $146.6m but currently values them at some $131.7m.
Along the way, there have been opportunistic sales of newly acquired vessels, now including the Songa Lynx.
One of the Vroon ships — the 1,688-teu Caribbean Express (to be renamed Songa Express built 2007) — has yet to be delivered from its charter to X-Press Feeders.
Songa Box now counts a fleet of seven feedermax and handysize container ships on the water and two 1,692-teu newbuildings scheduled for delivery in 2022 and 2023.
Tsakos selling too
Separately, French liner operator CMA CGM has snapped up the largest boxship in the fleet of Greece's Tsakos Shipping & Trading.
The 6,039-teu Irenes Wave (built 2008) has been purchased as part of a packaged deal including the charter of the 2,553-teu Irenes Rose (built 2007), according to Braemar ACM Shipbroking.
The Irenes Wave is currently on charter to German liner operator Hapag-Lloyd until the second quarter of 2022. It is worth about $76m, according to VesselsValue estimates.
The deal is the second between CMA CGM and Tsakos following the October sale of the 2,826-teu Irenes Respect (built 2006) for around $43m.
CMA CGM has been aggressively buying ships and has purchased more than 40 vessels in the last year, according to Alphaliner estimates.
Other recent purchases by the French carrier include the 3,091-teu Letavia (built 2005), renamed CMA CGM Paranagua, from Germany's Hammonia Reederei.
