Eyal Ofer’s Zodiac Maritime is selling its oldest crude tanker in a deal that will see the 19-year-old ship continue trading.
US brokers said the company has sold the 105,000-dwt Silver Sun (built 2001), which was built at Sumitomo Heavy Industries.
The tanker has gone to an undisclosed buyer for further trading for $11.5m.
The price is within range of separate estimates by VesselsValue and Maritime Strategies International valuations platform that forecast a ship of the Silver Sun's characteristics is worth between $9.7m and $12.5m.
Zodiac Maritime is the London-based ship management arm of Zodiac Group, the Monaco entity owned and chaired by Eyal Ofer.
The demolition value of the tanker is believed to be less than $5m.
The Silver Sun is due for special survey in October next year.
Its sale comes comes as aframax tankers have been sliding as charter market prospects have dimmed.
The Baltic Exchange's sale-and-purchase assessment for a five-year-old aframax has slid to $40.8m on Friday from a peak of $41.8m on 1 May. But the figure is still above the $40m price tag at the end of last year.
The Silver Sun sale is part of an effort by Zodiac to renew its crude tanker fleet.
In April, the company sold the 105,000-dwt Blue Sun (built 2000) to the UAE-based Kadar Management & Shipping reportedly for $8.5m. That tanker, which now is named Jubilant, was due for special survey when it was sold.
Zodiac has a highly diversified fleet with 133 ships listed with an average of eight years.
The company has 46 crude tankers, of which there are 19 aframaxes.
Zodiac is also modernising its bulker fleet.
As TradeWinds reported last week, it old its first capesize for demolition in more than two years, when it offloaded the 265,000-dwt Guofeng Enterprise (built 1993) for recycling in India.
Eric Martin contributed to this story.
