Shipping billionaire John Fredriksen continues to put his faith in the offshore shipping recovery.
His private Geveran Trading acquired a further 135,000 shares in Oslo-listed shipowner DOF Group on Thursday.
A filing revealed that the tycoon now has 18.55m shares, equating to a 10.04% stake.
This purchase would have cost NOK 12.44m ($1.13m) at Thursday’s price of NOK 92 per share in Oslo.
The stock is up 4.3% on the day, and the market cap is NOK 17bn.
Fredriksen first bought into the company in June 2023, as part of the $53m IPO it carried out after emerging from bankruptcy.
The DOF website lists his stake as 9.39% currently, the biggest shareholding.
This has been built from 8.27% earlier this year.
But when DOF’s $1.1bn takeover of Maersk Supply Service closes in the current quarter, its owner, AP Moller Holding, will be the biggest DOF shareholder on 25%.
Earlier in October, DOF pulled a secondary share offering after trading volumes soared.
$100m placement completed
The owner completed a $100m private placement to help fund the Maersk Supply Service deal in the summer.
It then announced a subsequent offering of up to 2m shares at the same price of NOK 99, for a total of NOK 198m ($18.6m).
But DOF said the stock has since been trading at or below this level at significant volumes.
A total of 31.8m shares have changed hands in that time, more than 15 times the size of the planned offering.
The average price has been NOK 92.
A subsequent offering directed towards Maersk Supply Service Holding was also cancelled.
Fredriksen was a big buyer in the first offering. Geveran Trading subscribed for $30m of the $100m.
