Euronav Announces Strongest Ever Second Quarter Operating Performance | Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide hellenicshippingnews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from hellenicshippingnews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Crude tankers stuck in ‘rate hell’ but floating-storage pain wanes
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil …” begins a psalm that might comfort today’s crude-tanker investors.
Crude tankers have been condemned to an extended stay in “spot-rate hell,” lamented Stifel analyst Ben Nolan in his latest quarterly outlook. He wrote that the sector is only at the “halfway point in the very long road through the Valley of Death.” Nolan quoted Winston’s Churchill’s advice: “If you are going through hell, keep going.”
Clarksons Platou Securities estimated that very large crude carriers (VLCCs, tankers that carry 2 million barrels of crude) were earning a mere $4,100 per day on Friday. At those rates, VLCC owners bleed cash. They can’t even cover a voyage’s operating expenses.