Ammonia/LPG Carriers Remain Newbuilding Favorites

Ship owners keep focusing on new fuel technologies, when it comes to newbuilding orders, with ammonia being among the preferred options at this stage. In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Allied Shipbroking said that “as the first month of 2024 concludes, we can see the continua tion of some of last year’s themes. In particular, contracting of ammonia/LPG carriers has remained strong and already we have seen around 20 such vessels reported as ordered, totalling more than 1.6m cbm. HD KSOE has been the main beneficiary of this trend, and accounts for comfortably over half of orders. Owners have displayed little appetite for LNG, with the exception of Qatar’s Nakilat and Qatar Energy. The latter also shows the emergence of Chinese yards in this field, with Hudong Zhongua reportedly set to build the 271k cbm vessels on behalf of the state-owned firm. A number of recently reported sales the declaration of options attached to deals reported in the final quarter of last year. In par ticular, Capital Gas is reported to have declared two options for liquid CO2 carriers, making them an earlier mover in this field. Purus Marine are thought to have their latest order backed by a TC to Ineos, in line with their Ethane-carrier deals announced last year”, the shipbroker said.

In a similar note, Banchero Costa commented that it was “a quiet week in the NB market with the Chinese New Year approaching. The most notable order in the dry bulk sector comes from Monaco based Owner Transocean Maritime, which booked 2 x 64,000 dwt Ultramax bulk carriers at New Dayang; the vessels will be conventionally fuelled and priced $34 mln each, dely in 2026. On smaller sizes, an orders for coastal vessels with the Dutch Owner Longship that booked 3 x 3,690 dwt dry cargo vessels at Dutch GS Shipyard: two of these vessel, which will be single open top box ship hold, have been ordered in partnership with Norwegian Wagle Chartering, who will provide employment through a long term charter. In the tanker sector, ExxonMobil reserved 2 slots at Samsung for the construction of 2 x 150,000 dwt shuttle tankers with delivery settled for June and December 2027. The energy major has also attached options for 2 more.

Eastern Pacific Shipping secured a slot for 1 x 155,000 dwt Suezmax at the Chinese shipyard New Times, with delivery scheduled for December 2025. The price has not been disclosed and it is also still not confirmed whether it is a resale of a slot or an entirely new deal. What is certain, however, is that slots with such short delivery times are now more than rare. In the gas carrier sector, NYK chose Hyundai to build a 174,000 cbm LNG carrier with a cost estimate of $262 million. The scheduled delivery is set for December 2027, accompanied by a long-term charter agreement with JERA. Greece’s Capital Gas returned to Hyundai Mipo for 2 more 22,000 cbm LCO2 (liquefied carbon dioxide) carriers. The vessels, priced $76,2 mln each will be delivered respectively in March and September 2027 and are capable of transporting also LPG and ammonia as the result of a joint project involving Capital, Hyundai Mipo and the Lloyd’s Register”.

Meanwhile, in the S&P market, Allied said that “on the dry bulk side, the snp market retained its upward momen tum for yet another week, with a strong number of transactions being reported. Medium size ranges (mainly Panamax and Supra max) dominated the market once again, with sales concentrated mostly in 10-15 years old range. Reflecting this seemingly abun dant buying interest, asset price levels have remained under up ward pressure since the year start. At this point, the market likely could prevail fairly liquid in the near term. On the tanker side, the snp market took a modest step forward, with a more robust number of units being reported as sold on a week-on-week basis. On the other hand, activity appears thinner from time to time, amidst the shifting dynamics from the side of earnings, so we should not be on any rush to take any form of upward momentum as granted”.

Banchero Costa added that “during the week a modern Chinese eco Ultramax SSI Splendid abt 64k blt 2019 Jinling (SS/DD due Apr 2024) has been sold at USD 30.3 mln to C. of Tri Bulk. Norwegian owners have sold the Sea Star abt 57 k blt 2014 Jiangdong for USD 15.5 mln, while Pan Ocean was reported to have sold Pan Pride abt 57k blt 2011 COSCO to Turkish interests at USD 12.85 mln.

A vintage handysize bulker Rattana Naree abt 28k blt 2002 Kanda (SS due 2027 BWTS fitted) was committed at USD 6.5 mln. In the tanker market after offers were invited on the 25ht of January the Japanese controlled Tohsi abt 300 k blt 2007 IHI (SS due 2027 DD due 2025 BWTS fitted) has been sold to Chinese buyers at mid USD 42 mln. A modern MR tanker St Pauli abt 50k blt 2017 HMD (SS due 2027 DD due 2025 BWTS fitted electronic ME) is reported to have been sold to c. of Ardmore at USD 42 mln, two weeks ago STI Tribeca abt 50k blt 2015 SPP ( BWTS fitted Scrubber fitted) was done at USD 39.1 mln”, the shipbroker concluded.
Nikos Roussanoglou, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide