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Team Tankers: Keen to play central role in chemical tanker consolidation

Westport: The chemical tanker is set for significant consolidation and Team Tankers is keen to play a central role in this process, its president and ceo tells Maritime CEO today.

“We believe,” says the Team Tankers boss, Hans Feringa, “the chemical tanker industry is poised for substantial consolidation among vessel operators that will greatly benefit both customers and shareholders alike. With our global network and vessel operating expertise, Team Tankers is ideally placed to play a leading role in the coming industry consolidation.”

Nine months into the top job at Team Tankers and Feringa has identified three areas for his chemical tankers to focus on, and is whittling his fleet down accordingly.

Team Tankers currently operates a fleet of 46 chemical tankers of which 35 are owned, six are bareboat charters and five are on time charter.

The three areas identified are its regional stainless steel fleet operating in the Mediterranean and between the Mediterranean and the European Continent. The company has 12 ships trading in this fleet and all are around 9,000 dwt for “optimal interchangeability”, Feringa says.

Then there is the regional coated fleet trading globally.

“With that we mean we trade these ships globally but on short haul trade lanes,” Feringa explains. Major tradelanes are US Gulf to Canada, to Mexico, to Caribs, intra-Asia trade lanes and in the Mediterranean. The company has 20 ships trading in this fleet making it the market leader and the ships are all around 13,000 dwt. ts

Finally, its IMO2 deepsea coated fleet of 10 ships trades globally.

“We have disposed of several vessels which did not fit in these categories and have plans to dispose of two more owned vessels and redeliver one vessel off of a time charter,” Feringa says, adding: “We will continue to exit the few ships that no longer fit the strategy and reinvest those funds and more into higher return potential assets.”

Team Tankers has recently added ships to both regional fleets creating the scale and coverage it requires. It is currently looking at opportunities to expand the IMO2 fleet after having added one vessel to the fleet recently.

The global orderbook for regional ships, both coated and stainless steel is “very low” at 3-5% for the next two years, Feringa observes. “Supply demand balance will tighten in these markets,” he says.

The orderbook for deepsea stainless vessels is high at well over 20% and Feringa says he anticipates “competitive pressure” here.

“There are also several new entrants into this business and it is unclear where they will trade their newbuildings when they deliver,” he adds.

Finally, the MR market shows an orderbook of 16% but this is where Team Tankers anticipates the highest demand growth as both the US Gulf and Arabian Gulf refinery expansion projects come onstream and export volumes rise significantly.

Feringa was formerly president of Stolt Tankers.

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