Freight rates for very large crude oil tankers (VLCCs) on major routes have been unusually weak, again recording their worst trading ever, with owners willing to accept only four-digit daily rates.
Under such circumstances, according to data from the Baltic Exchange (Baltic Exchange), the VLCC equivalent time charter equivalent rates (TCE) assessed by the agency continued to fall by $800 this Friday to -28354 USD/day! Obviously, this figure is lower than the record low of 27,893/day set on March 10.
Shipping brokerage firm Howe Robinson said in this week's market report that the Middle East VLCC route has directly "kneeled", and we have seen a large number of charters hitting new lows.
In addition, the fall in rent levels contrasted sharply with the rise in fuel prices. The rise in fuel oil prices has kept shipowners' earnings in a negative range.
According to Tankers International data, 7 VLCCs were booked on Thursday, and one of the 299,999dwt Ascona was the highest lease level, but the TCE was only US$8,342 per day. The charterer was Unipec UNIPEC, from West Africa to China. , the expected loading date is mid-April.
The lowest was - $5738/day for the 320,475 dwt Maran Canopus (built 2007) owned by Maran Tankers, scheduled to be loaded for Vietnam's NSRP in the Middle East Gulf in early April. The round is about to be docked for the third time this year and should be repaired.
However, figures from Tankers International show that all of those leases are ultimately expected to face losses.
Ascona was the only one successfully leased on the same day for the West Africa route. The other two 303,120-dwt Front Empire and 318,440-dwt Astro Chloe were not concluded.
"A charter that doesn't close will also end up causing more trouble for owners," Howe Robinson said. "However, as more and more owners refuse to execute long voyages at such low prices, we are seeing Owners are trying to get higher prices.”
Overall, the Baltic Dirty Tanker Index, the BDTI index rose 19 points to 1112 at the end of the week. The rise was mainly due to the TCE of Aframax vessels rising by $1,934 to $28,672/day, although suezmax vessels also fell by $1,530/day to $34,401/day.
The rise of aframax was mainly due to the increase of $16,710 on the TD17 Baltic-UK/Continental route, which closed at $133,657/day this week. This route, as well as the TD6 Black Sea to Mediterranean suezmax route, continues to rise, mainly because both routes involve Russian deals.
