Aegean Shipping Management Enters Dry Bulk Sector with Kamsarmax Newbuilding Order Adding More “Green Ships”
Aegean Shipping Management S.A. today announced the signing of a new building order of a series of 4+2+2 82,000 dwt ‘Kamsarmax’ Bulk Carriers to be constructed at Cosco Shipping Heavy Industry Co. Ltd, Cosco Zhoushan shipyard, with deliveries scheduled for the second half of 2019 onwards.
This marks the first move of Aegean Shipping Management into the dry bulk sector and will coincide with the creation of the spin-off Aegean Shipping Dry Bulk.
Announcing the order, Company Chairman George Melissanidis stressed: “We decided to move into the dry bulk sector now as an investment, taking advantage of the historically low asset price levels, combined with our belief that this sector is on its way to a sustainable recovery by 2018/19. We believe this is the right time to enter and we are very happy to be collaborating with our partners at Cosco Shipping in this exciting new venture for Aegean Shipping Management – I am convinced that the Dry Bulk development will prove a great success.”
This bulk carrier order will see the ships being delivered at a time when most industry analyses show the dry cargo sector to have recovered to long-term sustainable average rates as there will have been an increase in trade and we will have had more scrapping.
Company CEO, Apostolos Poulovassilis stressed: “This is a very significant newbuilding order for us and it is firmly aligned with our diversification and fleet expansion strategy via modern and efficient vessels. The specification for these vessels has been jointly developed with the yard and designers, COSCO and SDARI, and has been enhanced in accordance with our Company’s Green Fleet standards in order to meet and exceed industry demand requirements for this ship type.”