Summer Lull Not Enough to Slow Down Newbuilding Orders

Newbuilding ordering activity has remained high, despite the usual summer slowdown. In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Allied Shipbroking said that “over the past two weeks the pace of new order contracting has remained fairly high, with a decent number of tanker and container/general cargo orders stacking up. Newbuilding prices remain elevated as yards continue to fill their slots and schedule vessels for delivery into 2027 – there is no great need for prices to come down yet. Across all sectors these recent orders demonstrate the growing investment in owners readying themselves for the shift away from conventional marine fuels. Euronav’s latest order follows a pattern established over the previous few years as the company aims to avoid having bet on the wrong future fuel source. Over the past few years they have ordered Suezmax/VLCC vessels with the ability to run on LNG while being suitable for a methanol or ammonia retrofit at a later date. With similar flexibility, MSC have place an order for around $1.3bn for 10 LNG DF container vessels which are also suitable for ammonia/methanol conversion”.

In a separate note, Banchero Costa added that “Cido Shipping placed an order for 12 bulkers (Ultramax and Kamsarmax) in two different shipyards: Jiangsu New Hantong and New Dayang. Hantong is going to build 4 x Kamsarmax and 4 x Ultramax while Dayang will build 4 x Kamsarmax.

The vessels were priced $33 and $35 mln respectively. Deliveries expected in 2026. Laskaridis Shipping committed one LR2 at Yangzijiang Shipyard with delivery during Q1 2026, the price reported was slightly over $60 mln. Japan Marine United received an order from Kyklades Maritime for 2 x Suezmax with delivery end of 2025 and 1Q26, vessels priced at $81.5 mln”.

Meanwhile, in the S&P market, Allied added that “on the dry bulk side, in-line with seasonal trends, things were kept on a more quiet mode as of the past couple of weeks, with a noticeably more limited number of units being reported as sold. Reflecting this, there is mostly no direction in trend based on 4- week activity metrics, with momentum in smaller sizes even prevailing slightly on the negative side. That being said, in the past week, more sales involving Capesize vessels appeared which may help overall SnP market pivoting to more fervent territory in the near term. On the tanker side, the state of the market prevailed fairly sluggish, given the limited number of transactions coming to light as of late. Attuned to this, indicative asset prices remained mostly the same during the same time frame, indicating that we may have reached a plateau state, at least in the current price regime”, it concluded.

Banchero Costa added that “slow activity in both dry and tanker markets. Neda Maritime controlled ARIADNE 180,000 dwt Daewoo is reported sold at $21 mln. The Japanese built Kamsarmax ALAM KEKAL 82,000 dwt 2018 Oshima is rumoured sold to undisclosed buyers at $31.8 mln; back in June, the TESS82 RIKKE 2016 built was sold by Kambara Kisen to Greek Buyers at $27 mln. Two modern eco Ultramax BCs IVS BOSCH HOEK 60,000 dwt 2015 Onomichi and IVS HAYAKITA 60,000 dwt 2016 Mitsui are rumoured sold enbloc at $46.5 mln, allegedly to Eastern Mediterranean Maritime.

As a matter of comparison, the PCL controlled IKAN PULAS 63,000 dwt 2016 Shin Kasado (scrubber fitted) was reported sold in July for $28.5 mln. In the tanker segment, the only notable sale was the sale of MR Tanker BRUNSWICK 46,000 dwt 2010 Shin Kurushima rumored sold in the region of low/mid $24 mln to Vietnamese Buyers”, the shipbroker concluded.
Nikos Roussanoglou, Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide