In Hellenic Shipping News 25/03/2015
The tanker market’s booming and as such more and more owners are looking to capitalize. After all, banks are much more keen on providing finance for tankers, rather than dry bulkers, not matter how low the price. In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Allied Shipbroking said that “interest for tanker vessels continues to mount for new contracting, with the exceptional performance in the freight market seemingly with no end in sight. Caution needs to be exercised however amongst interested parties, as the fundamentals are not there, at least for the larger crude oil carriers, to support an overwhelming fleet growth over the coming years”.
Allied added that “having said that, it would inevitably be the case that new contracts would mount, especially as there is limited availability for cheap purchasing in the secondhand market, and even if you could find such a unit the price parity with a newbuilding seems to favor the newbuilding route for the time being. This week’s orders were mainly dominated by Greek tanker owners which either exercised options or took on the chance for further contracting. In terms of the dry bulk sector, it has been yet another “dry” week, which could quite possibly be a good thing as the freight market is still suffering heavy losses and there still seems to be an excess of vessels on order and scheduled for delivery over the next two years.
In a separate report, shipbroker Clarkson Hellas said that “in Tankers, BW Pacific are reported to have extended their order at STX by declaring their two optional 73,800 DWT LR1 product tankers for delivery within 1Q 2017. These will be the 5th and 6th vessel in the series and there are still two optional units left at STX’s Jinhae yard for BW. Hyundai Vinashin are reported have won an order for one firm plus one optional 50,000 DWT MR
product tankers for Top Ships with delivery set for 1H 2017 for the firm unit. If declared, the optional unit will be the 6th vessel in the series. Although the option is understood to have been declared in January, it came to light this week that Gefo have declared an option for one 6,400 DWT IMO-II stainless steel chemical tanker at Tersan Shipyard in Turkey. This will be the 4th vessel in the series and due to be delivered in 3Q 2016”.
The shipbroker added that there was “only one order to report this week in the gas market with KSS Line reported to have added one 38,000 CBM midsize LPG/Ammonia carrier by declaring an option at Hyundai Mipo. This additional unit will take this Owners orderbook at the yard to two vessels and will deliver in 1Q 2017. Finally in other sectors, COSCO Shipping (COSCOL) have announced the extension of their order at Hudong Zhonghua by
declaring an option to build two 1,000 TEU MPPs. This order will take the whole series up to 6 in total with price in the region USD 40 Mill per vessel, and will be built at Hudong Zhonghua’s affiliate yard Shanghai Shipyard for delivery throughout 2Q and 3Q in
2018. Auerbach Schiffart GmbH are reported to have declared an option for two 665 TEU MPPs at Jiangzhou Shipyard in China, which will be the 3rd and 4th unit in the series and will be delivered within 4Q 2016”, Clarkson Hellas concluded.
In a separate weekly report, shipbroker Intermodal noted that “the number of newbuilding orders reported in the market last week remained in line with recent activity volumes, with tanker orders still enjoying the lion’s share amongst them and prices pretty much in line with the market as despite the steady flow of tanker orders of late, it seems that it is still hard for yards to make a case for a premium nowadays. At the same time it is no surprise that ordering interest over at the dry bulker side remains sluggish especially when it comes to the larger sizes, while the fact that despite the enormous pressure rates have been under the Capesize newbuilding price is still holding above the average of both 2012 and 2013, is definitely another reason to believe that further price corrections might be on the way. In terms of recently reported deals, Singaporean owner, BW Group, exercised an option for a pair of LR1s (73,800dwt) at STX , in S. Korea, for a price of $ 46.9m and delivery set in March of 2017″, it concluded.
