Spot rates for MR product tankers in the Atlantic took flight on Tuesday, taking a single day to claw back nearly all of the ground lost over the prior two weeks.

The Baltic Exchange’s assessment of time charter equivalent rates for key MR tanker routes in the region surged to nearly $27,600 per day. That is up 65.5% from Monday, when TCE earnings stood at just under $16,800 per day.

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Tuesday’s spot market average was the highest since 3 July, when rates topped $28,000 per day before plunging to just above $15,600 last week, but it is still well below the peak of nearly $75,000 per day in early December.

UK shipbroker Howe Robinson estimated that an eco tanker, which has an electronic injection engine that reduces fuel consumption, could earn $34,700 per day on Tuesday on the triangular trade from Amsterdam to New York, and returning with cargo loaded in Houston.

That is up from $21,900 per day on Monday.

The gains were fuelled by a busy day for chartering MRs in continental Europe, amid strong enquiry from charterers, the broker said.

The last fixture of the day came in at just under WorldScale 138 to move a 37,000-tonne cargo from the Baltic region across the Atlantic.

That was a jump from just under WS 113 earlier in the day.

“Owners’ sentiment remains firm as the position list now looks considerably tighter,” Howe Robinson said.

Adding to the tightness is a strong market in the US Gulf Coast, where Howe Robinson estimated that rates jumped to WS 162 on Tuesday from WS 113 a day earlier to carry 38,000 tonnes of clean products from Houston to Amsterdam.

Those healthy rates could lead shipowners that have delivered cargoes to the US East Coast to ballast south to load a backhaul cargo in Houston.

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