Is the sale of a 14-year old Post-Panamax Containership for Scrap a New Trend? Craig Jallal, senior data editor of mapping, ship search and valuation service VesselsValue, examines the question
To set the sale in context, the average age of all sizes of Containerships sold for scrap in 2014 and 2015, was around 22-years old. There have been relatively few Post-Panamax Containership sold for scrap, but the average age at the time of sale was around 19.5-years old. Therefore, the 2002-built, 5,447-teu Post-Panamax Containership Conti Taipei was sold relatively young, but this does not appear to be a one-off event.
There have been three other 2002-built Post-Panamax Containerships sold in the last six months. All three were built at quality shipyards in South Korea, and at the time of sale their next Special Surveys were not due for at least twelve months or more.
Other distinguishing features were that all three vessels were owned by German companies, and had been inactive at least six to three months before the sale, according to the VesselsValues vessel tracking module VV+.
Using the ship search VV+ module, it is possible to filter the Post-Panamax Containership fleet for similar ships i.e., built between 1999 and 2003, owned by a German company, and with Special Survey due before 1 May 2017. The VV+ search returns 17 candidate ships from a potential fleet of over 1,000 Post-Panamax Containerships.
Two of the 17 vessels on the candidate list have been in-active for at least eight months. These two ships are currently stationed among a group of islands close to the city of Zhoushan (near Shanghai) in China. These are sisters-ships, and are currently valued at $17m each, with a demolition value of around $8m. One of the above islands, Daixizhen Island, has also recently become the host to two more Post-Panamax Containerships. These are also sister-ships, with a current value of $16m, and a demolition value of $7m. Now that the scrap price is firmer, it will be interesting to see if these relatively young Post-Panamax Containers ships are sold for scrap, too.