Just a few weeks after confirming a major deal to offload its five oldest VLCCs, Frontline is now moving to shake out one of its oldest suezmaxes.
Market sources and brokers in Athens and London are saying the John Fredriksen company is receiving between $45.5m and $46m from the sale of the 156,700-dwt Front Odin (built 2010).
The buyer is Piraeus-based NGM Energy.
This is not the first time the Moundreas family firm has bought a Jiangsu Rongsheng-built suezmax from a company backed by Fredriksen.
In April, New York-listed SFL Corp revealed it banked a net $41.1m from the sale of the sister ship Everbright to NGM, which has been trading since as the Otis.
The sale now to the same buyer of the scrubber-fitted Front Odin provides solid evidence of firming secondhand values for such ships, amid a robust tanker market that most market analysts expect to last for quite some time.
Rolling three-month average prices for 15-year suezmaxes currently stand at $45m, according to Clarksons. This is their highest level since late 2008.
The rising trend is also evident by comparing the sale of the Front Odin to another sister ship sold by Frontline at the end of May 2023.
Pure-play strategy
The Front Njord, which fetched $44.5m at the time, has emerged since as the Fast Kathy in the fleet of United Arab Emirates-based Radiating World Shipping Services.
In December 2022, Frontline sold a one-year older sister ship, the Front Balder, to clients of Turkey’s Pier Denizcilik for $39.5m. That vessel is currently trading as the Bay Global.
Alongside the string of suezmaxes sold in that period, Frontline also divested six VLCCs built in 2009 and 2010 to focus on more modern tonnage.
TradeWinds has reported how the company attained $61m in January 2023 from the sale of the 321,000-dwt Front Eminence (renamed FPSO Agogo, built 2009). In January 2024, a further $290m followed from an en-bloc sale of five VLCCs to South Korea’s Sinokor Merchant Marine.
All these moves went hand in hand with a $2.35bn deal last year that saw Frontline acquiring 24 modern VLCCs from Euronav.
Analysts have said that Frontline would continue selling its older suezmaxes as it moves towards a pure play on modern tankers.
“We wouldn’t be surprised if Frontline further offloaded their oldest suezmaxes,” analysts at Fearnley Securities said on 15 January.
Following the sale of the Front Odin to NGM, Oslo-listed Frontline is left with another two identical sister ships — the scrubber-fitted Front Thor and Front Loki (both built 2010).
These are the oldest units in Frontline’s fleet of 24 suezmaxes.
