Hot on the heels of completing a newbuilding programme for a quartet of ultra-modern, dual-fuel VLCCs, Advantage Tankers is taking preliminary steps to embark on another one — this time for suezmaxes.
According to its chief executive officer Tugrul Tokgoz, the Geneva-based company has signed a letter-of-intent (LOI) to build a trio of 158,000-dwt ships.
The vessels are to be LNG dual fuel-ready and equipped with scrubbers.
A final contract will be signed after technical discussions with the shipyard involved. Togkoz disclosed neither the planned vessels’ price nor the builder’s.
According to Allied QuantumSea, a shipping research outfit based in Athens, each of the suezmaxes will cost $79m and will be ordered at DH Shipbuilding, which is due to deliver them in 2025.
News about the LOI comes just a few days after Advantage Tankers took delivery from DSME of the 299,600-dwt newbuilding Advantage Vital (built 2023).
This was the last in a string of four dual-fuel VLCC tankers that Advantage Tankers had ordered at the South Korean yard, which started delivering them late last year.
Even before they were delivered, Togkoz had told TradeWinds that the VLCCs didn’t mark the end of his company’s expansion drive.
Nazli Williams-controlled Advantage Tankers has more than doubled in size since its establishment in 2014.
Including the new VLCC quartet and the three suezmaxes it plans to order, the company will manage a fleet of 26 tankers consisting of six VLCCs, 10 suezmaxes, three aframaxes, two LR2s and five MR1 product carriers.
Advantage Tankers’ LOI for suezmaxes was a rare sign of life in an otherwise quiet market for tanker newbuildings this week.
High newbuilding prices, full shipyard slots and uncertainty about future environmental regulation continue to keep a lid on new investment.
The orderbook for large tankers has been particularly affected. The ratio of contracted VLCC and suezmax newbuildings to the existing fleet of such vessels in the water has been at their lowest level in at least 30 years.
Suezmax newbuildings, however, have started going up lately.
According to Clarksons figures, the ratio in question rose to 3.2% this month from 2.15% in October 2022, which was the lowest Clarksons figure on record.
The VLCC orderbook ratio, by contrast, has kept dropping to 2.1% this month, which is a fresh record low since 1996, when the Clarksons timeseries began.
