Older VLCCs continue to be traded actively in the secondhand market, fetching prices unheard of for owners prescient or lucky enough to have bought them at the bottom of the market years ago.
The news came as a shock in October when an 18-year-old ship, the 306,600-dwt Princess Mary (built 2004), found buyers at an elevated price of between $48m and $50m.
Now, that shock pricing has become the new normal as several brokers in Athens, London and the US report the same vessel as sold again at an even higher $51m.
Officials at the ship’s manager, Hellenic Tankers, were not immediately available for comment.
It seems the owners of the Princess Mary resisted the temptation to sell the vessel in October, wisely betting on even higher prices to come.
The sale represents a brilliant asset play for the clients of Hellenic Tankers, who had spent just $22.5m to purchase the ship five years ago.
Amid insatiable appetite for older tankers in the wake of Western sanctions against Russia, Asian buyers have been scooping up such tonnage at steadily rising prices, as TradeWinds has repeatedly reported.
Secondhand crude tanker prices have hit their highest levels for 25 years as owners seek to tap into surging tonne-miles linked to Russia’s war in Ukraine, shipowner body Bimco said last week.
While buyers in India and the Middle East tend to focus on suezmaxes, aframaxes and product tankers, interests based in China and Hong Kong are relatively more active in VLCCs.
Brokers believe the Princess Mary’s buyers are based in China.
The same seems to be the case with another VLCC that has passed under new ownership this month.
US brokers report the 301,000-dwt Ace Porter (built 2008) as being sold for an undisclosed price.
Juicy profit
The S&P Global Markets data bank shows the vessel is already trading under its new name, Erecter. The registered owner and ship manager is Typical Profit, a one-ship entity based in the British Virgin Islands.
The VLCC’s ISM manager is listed as Shanghai-based Lucky Ascend Ship Management, another one-ship entity.
The previous, undisclosed owners of the Ace Porter turned in a juicy profit even quicker than Hellenic Tankers’ clients did.
They had spent just $37m to buy the vessel in August 2022 from New York-listed DHT Holdings, as TradeWinds reported at the time.
Vessel valuation platform Signal Ocean suggests the ship’s value rose to nearly $60m over the past two months. VesselsValue suggests the Ace Porter was flipped in mid-February.
