Demand Still High in the S&P Market

In direct contrast to the newbuilding market, where things have been not that active, the S&P market has been quite vivid. In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Allied Shipbroking said that “on the dry bulk side, a yet another interesting week took place for the SnP market, given the fair number of units changing hands. However, thinking about the fact that we are just a breath before the close of the year, we can expect the typical Christmas holidays lull to take hold and overall volume levels to drop in the near term. All-inall, a lot will depend on how things develop from the side of earnings, where the hefty corrections of late can derail the general bullish buying momentum significantly. On the tankers side, it was a very “strong” week in terms of activity taking place.

It is true that for some time now, overall buying appetite has been on an upward orbit, with many interested parties having already taken a relatively bullish stance for the upcoming period. Hopefully, with freight earnings returning to more robust levels, we can anticipate a firm SnP market to develop, both in terms of transaction volumes and asset price levels”.

In a separate note, Banchero Costa added that “this week, just before Christmas, has been extremely rich in terms of sales in all segments, with nearly 40 units sold between dry and tanker vessels. The highlights would go again to the drybulk secto, however it’s been a long time we haven’t been seeing so many modern tankers transactions. VLCC resale ex Hyundai Samho goes to Greek buyers for $97.5 mil bases delivery 2022. LR2 ‘PROSKY’ 115,000 dwt 2019 Daehan (BWTS fitted) has achieved a firm $52 mil from Neda Maritime. MR2 resale ex Hyundai Mipo went to Dee4 Capital for $38,25 mil bases delivery March 2022.

In the drybulk sector most attention was dedicated to the ultra-supra / handysize range. Two ultramax resales ‘NORD ALEGRO’ and ‘NORD ADAGIO’ 61,000 dwt 2022 are picked up for $33.8 mil each by undisclosed buyers. Ultramax ‘NORD COLUMBIA’ 60,000 dwt 2018 Oshima was also offloaded (after the sister ‘NORD COLORADO) for $32 mil, higher price also due to the vessel being scrubber fitted. Large handy bulkers ‘NORDRUBICON’ and ‘NORDCOLORADO’ 38,000 dwt 2016 Ouhua, China were sold for $21.9 mil each, a slight discount likely linked to the yard background – we can compare with same size ‘CRIMSON PRINCESS’ 38,000 dwt Naikai 2012 which has in fact achieved $19.5 mil bases SS/DD due in June 2022”, the shipbroker concluded.

Intermodal added that “the tanker SnP activity took a break last week with only a handful of units changing hands. On the other hand, dry bulk secondhand activity was healthy with handysize units almost monopolizing buyers’ interest. In the tanker sector, we had the sale of the “GUANABARA” (106,045dwt-blt ‘07, Japan), which was sold to Greek buyers for a price in the region of low $16.0m. On the dry bulker side sector, we had the sale of the “BELOCEAN” (58,018dwt-blt ‘11, China), which was sold to German buyers for a price in the region of $19.6m”, the shipbroker concluded.
Nikos Roussanoglou, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide