In a weekly market briefing Omar Nokta, a forecaster at Clarkson Capital Markets, noted medium-range (MR) product tankers, for instance, are achieving returns that are similar to those of VLCCs trading in the spot market.
“Thus far into 2015 much of the attention on the tanker market has been on VLCCs, which are currently earning $45,000 per day on the spot market and have averaged a rather healthy $56,000 per day year-to-date,” he said.
“This is quite stronger than the 2014 year-to-date period in which VLCCs had averaged $33,500 erday. Based on our Clarksons five-year-old VLCC assessment of $81m, spot rate averages so far this year imply an EBITDA yield of 20%.
“Interestingly the product segment has strengthened considerably as well, beyond our initial estimates, with MRs currently earning $23,900 per day and have averaged $21,200 per day for 2015.
“The year-to-date average also implies an EBITDA yield of 20% based on our Clarksons five-year-old MR assessment of $27m.”
Accordingly, Nokta said he sees “good value” in the MR segment, and feels the same way about the VLCC sector as well, but noted suezmaxes and aframaxes are still the biggest “outperformers” with yields of roughly 25% each.
“Tanker rates across the board are at higher levels than expected for this time of year, given the reduced seasonal demand,” he added. “Should this trend continue in the coming months, we expect a sizable increase in secondhand values.”
