Tankerska Plovidba, a Croatian shipowner with nearly 70 years of history behind it, is said to be divesting its last suezmax at a remarkably high price.
Several brokers in the US, Greece and London report that the company has clinched a deal with undisclosed buyers to offload the 166,200-dwt Donat (built 2007).
Managers at Mario Pavic-led Tankerska Plovidba did not respond to a request for comment.
However, the incentive to sell the vessel would certainly be there if reports are accurate that Tankerska Plovidba found buyers willing to pay more than $40m for the vessel. Depending on the broker reporting, the price could be even higher — from $41.1m to $42m.
This is far above the $39.8m that Signal Ocean estimates the ship to be worth at present.
Contrary to VLCCs, which saw their values drop somewhat from peaks reached earlier this year, suezmax prices have continued to climb.
According to analysis published by Athens-based Xclusiv Shipbrokers on Monday, 15-year-old suezmaxes are on average worth $39m — up by around 3% since January.
One additional reason for the good price fetched by the Donat may be that the ship passed special survey in September last year and will therefore not have to incur that significant expense again before the middle of 2027.
Most of the vessel’s employment in recent years had been lifting cargoes from the Caspian Pipeline Consortium terminal for Kazakh oil near Novorossiysk.
Tankerska Plovidba used to operate three suezmaxes — all ordered at the local Brodosplit yard between 2000 and 2004. But the company sold two of them between 2015 and 2017, one each to Eurotankers and Ancora Investment Trust.
Eurotankers and Ancora flipped those two suezmaxes at a considerable profit just a few months ago.
A sale of the Donat would not reduce Tankerska Plovidba’s crude carrier footprint by much. The company owns four aframaxes directly and six MR tankers indirectly, through its Tankerska Next Generation unit.
Tankerska Plovidba also owns three handysize bulkers and six catamaran passenger ships.
The Donat sale has been the most remarkable tanker deal reported amid what continues to be a slow secondhand market for oil carriers.
‘Tardy phase’
“The ongoing tardy phase in terms of activity ... is slowly taking a longer-term shape, a state that we can hardly escape from during the typical sluggish summer period,” Allied QuantumSea noted on 17 July.
Following a complete market standstill around the turn of the month, at least some deals are now being reported.
In one of them, Greece’s Leon Shipping & Trading is believed to have achieved a $25m asset play with the 37,600-dwt Leon Poseidon (built 2011).
The Panos Efthimiadis-led company had acquired the MR product tanker from Socatra about two years ago for a mere $15.75m.
In another MR deal, Angola’s Sonangol is linked to a deal worth between $37.5m and $38m for Dong-A Tanker Corp’s scrubber-fitted, 50,000-dwt Dong-A Triton (built 2015).
In similar tonnage, Grand Yang Shipping is believed to have sold the 53,100-dwt MR New Jupiter (built 2008) for $21.5m. The Chinese company purchased that ship just nine months ago from Sweden’s Rederi AB Gotland at a lower price of $18.5m.
