China Merchants Energy Shipping (CMES) has signed an agreement with Vale Shipping Singapore to acquire four used Valemaxes for an aggregate of USD448 million.
The four vessels are scheduled for delivery in September 2015, a stock filing of CMES said on 31 July. CMES plans to finance the acquisition with its own funds and bank loans.
The deal came after the Chinese government granted permission for Valemaxes to dock at Chinese ports. In early July, five ore terminals in China were allowed by the Ministry of Transport (MOT) to be docked by the 400,000 dwt Valemaxes. The terminals identified were Dagushan port area in Dalian with one iron ore berth, Caofeidian port area in Tangshan with two berths, Dongjiakou port area in Qingdao with one berth, Majishan Iron Ore terminal in Ningbo-Zhoushan port with one berth, and Shulanghu iron ore terminal in Ningbo-Zhoushan port with two berths.
In May, Cosco Group and China Shipping (Group), two of China’s largest shipping companies, have already teamed up to acquire four used Valemaxes from Vale for USD445 million.
In September 2014, China COSCO and CMES signed 25-year-term contracts of affreightment (COAs) with Vale. The Chinese bulker operators are expected to order ten new Valemaxes each to serve the COAs.
This post was sourced from IHS Maritime 360: View the original article here.
