Concordia Maritime president Kim Ullman has outlined an ambition to expand the fleet while conditions are favourable.
He told TradeWinds the next three months could be key for adding to the Stena Bulk-controlled company's 12 product tankers and a lone suezmax.
Ullman told analysts on an earlier conference call that the fleet had "not expanded lately".
"We have concluded that even though we would like to add on capacity, it was not the right time to do that, certainly not in April and May, not June/July either, but certainly in the months to come we are interested in seeing what could be done to add to capacity," he added.
He told TradeWinds that vessels were "a little pricey" earlier this year, but since then values have declined.
"Am I interested in general in adding ships? Yes, it's a good time over the next three months," he added.
"We'll be back on track market-wise by next year."
He said on the conference call: "I believe in continuation. If you are good at one thing you should try to stick to that, and we are closer to the product tankers.
"It could be a combination of both newbuildings and secondhand, but we will not order newbuildings on a speculative basis — we don't want to add to that orderbook."
Ullman explained that secondhand prices are currently "attractive", as they did not rise as much as the spot market did earlier this year.
Rates hit record levels in the first part of the quarter, but "half of May was bad and June was bad, and July and August have continued the same path", Ullman said.
"The party was over. In April and May, it was party time, people were stocking up with the low oil prices."
Quicker recovery coming?
Ullman has a downbeat view of subdued demand and lower rates for the rest of this year, but believes market fundamentals, including a low orderbook, will mean better times in 2021.
"There are lots of things that could push things up this year, like sanctions, but you can't really bet on sanctions," he added.
"The Covid-19 hangover will last for some months, but we will have a quicker recovery than people think."
The Concordia boss also said the storage situation with product tankers is unwinding quickly.
"You have to remember there are always some product tankers on storage charters — it will never be zero — but from the peak in May/June, half of the ships are already back," he told TradeWinds.
More will follow this year, depressing rates, he said.
The Denmark-based tanker owner reported net earnings of SEK 28.3m ($3.26m) in an "extremely volatile" second quarter, against a loss of SEK 39.2m in the same period last year.
Revenue rose to SEK 300.7m against SEK 252.7m, while the first half saw the company amass a profit of SEK 57.3m, from a loss of SEK 37.5m a year ago.
