Shares in Tufton Oceanic Assets Ltd are expected to begin trading on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) later today.
Its admission to the Specialist Funds Segment of the London main market comes after the company raised $91m through the issue of 91m shares earlier this week.
Dealings in its ordinary shares are due to start at 8:00 am local time and will trade under the ticker 'SHIP'.
“Tufton believes there is currently an attractive opportunity in shipping to buy assets at a significant discount to their depreciated replacement cost and lock in long term employment producing mid-teen cash yields,” said Andrew Hampson, head of asset backed investments for Tufton Oceanic Ltd.
“This is a strategy we've been following with success for the last couple of years and see limited competition due to the lack of capital currently being invested in shipping.”
Cenkos Securities PLC and Hudnall Capital LLP acted as joint placing agents and financial advisers, while N+1 Singer Advisory was joint placing agent.
“Over the past few years, Tufton has invested over $1bn in shipping,” said Paulo Almeida, portfolio manager for Tufton Oceanic.
“This asset class took much longer than most to recover from the global financial crisis.
"Due to the supply-side improvement of the past few years in both shipping and shipbuilding, we believe that the current risk-return profile in shipping is superior to many other asset classes.
“We also believe this is the first listed equity anywhere that aims to offer institutional investors exposure to a diverse portfolio of ship types with low revenue volatility and low to moderate leverage.”
