![COLUMN | Quick updates: tanker bonanza: Euronav and Frontline sell VLCCs and invest in offshore; sinking Suezmax threatens Oman [Offshore Accounts]](http://media.assettype.com/bairdmaritime%2F2026-08-16%2F6ienf68e%2FUntitled-November-24-2025-at-09.11.06-1.jpeg?w=480&auto=format%2Ccompress&fit=max)
It’s the holiday season. Europe and North America are suffering from yet more heat waves, but the tanker markets, both sale and purchase and chartering, are also red hot.
Abu Dhabi’s ADNOC paid just under US$750 million, an average of US$124.5 million per vessel, for six second-hand very large crude carriers (VLCC) earlier this month, Gosships Intelligence reports. These vessels were built between 2012 and 2017. Five of the tankers were purchased from Frontline, the publicly listed tanker operator of which Cypriot shipping magnate John Fredriksen is the Chairman and 36 per cent shareholder. The purchases more than double ADNOC’s fleet of six VLCCs today.
Aged tonnage selling for above newbuild prices is the ultimate sign of a market that is peaking (Capesize in 2007, anyone, or rigs in 2013?), with one-year time charter rates for these two-million-barrel capacity VLCC beasts now hitting US$117,000 per day, as per the excellent Fearnleys’ Fearnpulse website.
Fearnleys also prices a newbuild order for a VLCC at US$129 million, and second-hand VLCC prices have also risen to unprecedented highs, as the ADNOC purchases revealed.
When it reported its results for the first three months of the year, Frontline announced a profit of US$559 million, and “adjusted profit” of US$345 million, excluding the gain on the sale of ships. This was Frontline’s strongest profit since the fourth quarter of 2004, showing how the American and Israeli attacks on Iran in late February and the subsequent closure of the Strait of Hormuz have given tanker owners a once-in-a-generation opportunity for super profits.
For tanker owners, the words of Tidewater’s then-CFO Keith Lousteau from 2006 sum up the current VLCC market:
“What a great time... It’s kind of, come to the office in the morning, get a wheelbarrow to bring the cash to the bank. It’s just been a real nice position.”
But this being shipping, no sooner have the bumper tanker profits been banked, than owners are looking to profit from the wartime opportunity… by ordering new ships, a tale as old as ship-owning itself.
One imagines that in Antiquity when Odysseus’s fleet was destroyed at the hands of the brutal Laestrygonian giants, rates for penteconters in the Aegean soared, and then Athenians rushed to over-ordering new triremes at shipyards, in effect making them true ancestors of today’s Greek owners on a buying binge.
BIMCO has noted that there have been orders for 151 VLCCs up to the end of June this year, which is more than double the total number of orders placed in the whole of 2025. This year’s orders alone are sufficient to replace almost all the 160 VLCCs in the global fleet of 895 VLCCs that are over 20 years of age, as per the May 2026 Frontline results presentation.
However, the total crude tanker orderbook across all sizes has hit a record high of 130 million DWT, representing 27 per cent of the current fleet. With shipyard slots sold out in China, where over 80 per cent of tankers are built, deliveries are now scheduled through 2030. One of the reasons rates have jumped so high now is that from 2023 to 2025, annual deliveries of tankers averaged less than 10 million DWT. They will be three times that across the next four years.
I mention this not because it is a market I especially care about or understand, but because the surge in tanker orders will likely lead to longer delivery times for new floating production and floating storage units for offshore projects, delaying first oil. It is clearly a factor in the absurdly long lead time for Cadeler’s US$929 million pair of new wind turbine jackups, as we examine below. The spate of newbuild tankers will also potentially crowd out any offshore newbuildings, as Chinese yards fill their books with profitable tanker orders.
Additionally, much of the speculative cash washing through global shipping markets will not be directed to offshore newbuilds, at least not for the time being, but will be directed into tanker flipping and that sizzling market. This is welcome news for Tidewater, where the average fleet age profile of the world’s largest offshore support vessel (OSV) operator has now exceeded 13.6 years as per its latest investor presentation.
It is also very telling that two of the biggest tanker owners are actually selling tankers and taking profits.
Whom do you trust to have timed the market right? Emirati state-owned ADNOC, a company whose unusual sale and purchase transactions in offshore vessels have raised some eyebrows in the past, or John Fredriksen and the Saverys family of Belgium, owners who have ridden out multiple shipping cycles?
The two European billionaire tanker tycoons may have very publicly fought for control of crude oil ship owner Euronav in 2024, but this year’s surge in tanker values proved they were both right to pursue control of that target company so bitterly and fiercely. And now, classic peak of market signal, both are divesting tankers at record rates for huge one-time profits.
In January, Frontline announced that it would be selling eight of the company’s oldest VLCCs built between 2015 and 2016 for US$832 million, generating net cash proceeds of approximately US$486 million after the debt on the ships is repaid, and over US$200 million in profits.
At the same time, Mr Fredriksen’s privately held company Hemen Holdings sold Frontline nine newbuild VLCCs for delivery in China this year and next year, for US$1.224 billion, a neat flip from his private company to the public one to capitalise on soaring VLCC demand.
So, Mr Fredriksen flipped newbuild tankers into Frontline, then Frontline flipped older tankers out to ADNOC and Sinokor, which was believed to be the buyer behind the January sale of the eight VLCCs by Frontline.
Mr Fredriksen himself is selling tankers big time. What’s he buying?
On July 9, Hemen Holding crossed the Rubicon of owning 50 per cent of rig owner Northern Ocean. Northern Ocean is the vehicle Mr Fredriksen created to buy rigs cheaply in the offshore downturn. It subsequently sold the semi-sub Deepsea Bollsta to Odfjell Drilling for US$480 million in December last year, leaving it only with sister harsh environment semi-sub Deepsea Mira, which recently completed a successful well for Shell in Namibia and which is rumoured to be chartered shortly by another exploration programme there.
Crossing the half ownership threshold means that under Norwegian Stock Exchange rules, Hemen is obliged to make a mandatory offer to all the shareholders in Northern Ocean. The offer document was approved last week by the Norwegian Financial Supervisory Authority in its capacity as takeover supervisory authority.
Don’t look at the record profits Frontline is making. Look at where Frontline’s main shareholder is spending the bumper profits: offshore drilling.
It is the same at the Saverys’ family tanker powerhouse Euronav, owned by their publicly listed CMB Tech. In May 2026, Euronav divested two VLCCs – Ingrid and Ilma – yielding approximately US$98 million in capital gains, and a third VLCC sale was announced in early August, that of Donoussa (2016-built, 299,999 DWT). The Donoussa sale will generate a capital gain of approximately US$74 million, the company reported.
Like Frontline, Euronav also sold VLCCs in January. Then Euronav disposed of six vessels sold, being Daishan (2007-built) and five VLCCs built from 2011 through to the youngest, 2016-built Aegean. According to CMB Tech, that sale generated a capital gain of approximately US$261 million against book values.
The Belgian summer also saw Euronav reporting the sale of three smaller Suezmax crude oil tankers, with around one million barrels of capacity apiece. Again, the sale prices reflect the massive hike in second-hand values and charter rates for Suezmaxes. At the end of June, Euronav sold the tankers Brest and Brugge (sister vessels built in 2023, each 156,851 DWT). This sale achieved a capital gain of approximately US$101 million for the company, based on the net sale price and book values.
Then last week, the company made an even bigger profit per vessel, flipping the Suezmax Bristol, which was built in 2024. This sale will generate a capital gain of approximately US$57 million in the fourth quarter of the year, the company said. Bear in mind that time charter rates for Suezmaxes for one year are around US$75,000 per day, and a new build for delivery in 2029 will cost US$88 million, as per Fearnpulse.
"Historically strong Suezmax valuations have created an opportunity to unlock value at an attractive point in the cycle," CMB Tech CEO Alexander Saverys noted, with the dry understatement for which Antwerp is famed. "We will deploy those returns in line with our capital allocation strategy and invest in the continued growth of our diversified maritime group."
Like Mr Fredriksen, CMB Tech is continuing to invest significantly in offshore. The company has already taken delivery of three large construction service operation vessels (CSOVs), noting that the “C” in this acronym normally stands for "commissioning" rather than "construction". The most recent is the 89-metre-long, DP2-capable Windcat Haarlem, which arrived in Singapore at the end of last month after delivery in Vietnam in May. Three more sister CSOVs are on order at the same yard in Vietnam.
In November last year, Windcat signed another newbuilding contract with for a new "multi-purpose accommodation support vessel" (MP-ASV), with the option to build five additional vessels of this type. The subsea-capable vessels will combine a large open deck with an area of 750 square metres and an active heave-compensated crane of 150 tonnes capacity with fuel-efficient operations for ROV support, a helideck and comfortable, high-quality accommodation. The Windcat MP-ASVs will measure 102 by 20 metres.
When we see Windcat exercise some of the options vessels, we will really know that CMB Tech is funnelling its tanker profits into offshore. But the US$450 million already committed to the seven firm orders is proof that the family has confidence for now, at least.
Michelle Wiese Bockmann has detailed coverage of the dirty side of the tanker business. Whilst the serious and safety-oriented players are making out like bandits on bumper profits, the aged and unsafe "dark fleet" of tankers carrying sanctioned Iranian and Russian oil continue to threaten the marine environment and the safety of seafarers working on them.
Whilst modern Suezmaxes fetch premiums of tens of millions of dollars, the 2001-built Suezmax Caroline Bezengi (IMO 9224439) falsely flagged to Cameroon, with unknown beneficial owners and completely absent managers, fully laden with one million barrels of oil, is now breaking up in the Arabian Sea.
This is the environmental disaster that we, and numerous industry specialists, have warned could happen. Cameroon has already quickly disowned the vessel and struck it off the registry – as a leading flag for dark fleet vessels, Cameroon seems quick to collect cash fees from the shadowy owners, but even quicker to avoid responsibility for the massive ecological damage the vessel could cause.
The tanker grounded inside an Omani marine reserve on June 12, following an explosion on board whilst in transit off Yemen. The crew are safe and have been evacuated, but an oil spill is spreading off Jazirat Al Qibliyyah.
Ms Wiese Bockmann reports that Oman's Environment Authority confirmed the spill now covers around a 400-square-kilometre radius and the first oil has now reached land, fouling beaches and jeopardising marine wildlife and seabirds. UK-based security and risk company Ambrey has been contracted to salvage the tanker.
The concluding paragraphs of her excellent piece are especially sobering. I quote them at length because they are an excellent summary of the challenges the dark fleet raises for the whole tanker industry, for IMO governance, for port and littoral states, and the structure of open registries (also known as “flags of convenience”). Follow her on Linkedin and support the excellent work her employer Windward does in maritime intelligence:
“Who will ultimately be paying these costs and other bills hasn’t yet been determined. That’s because this vessel is stateless. This means any P&I insurance it had to cover the cost of oil spills, has been invalidated by this status. We don't know who issued the blue card, presumably a Russian insurer.
"Insurers have been warning about this for years. These vessels have ignored international maritime regulations and conventions designed to protect the environment and keep the seas safe.
"Which oil company/trader/refinery owned the cargo? Who chartered the ship? Which port was this vessel going to? Who is going to pick up the multimillion-many-times-over cost of a huge oil spill like this? Who is the beneficial owner (hidden behind anonymous China SVPs)? Nobody knows.
"Given the date of the attack was early June, it’s very likely that Cameroon’s ship registry expelled the ship after the accident, and/or reviewed the ship after it came to its attention and realised it wasn’t with the ship register but was falsely claiming to fly its flag.
"I suspect the former, not the latter. It’s very common for poorly managed and permissive ship registries like Cameroon (the second largest flagger of Western-sanctioned Russia tonnage after Russia) to de-flag ships that are in trouble.”
Happy holidays. We wish Ambrey every success with this salvage, an incident that should never have happened.
Even if the beach sucks and the restaurants are crowded and overpriced, remember there are always those less fortunate than you.
Consider Georgian master mariner Avtandil Kalandadze, who has been sentenced in the US District of Columbia Federal Court to 10 months' imprisonment after the run-around he gave to the US Coast Guard in the Atlantic whilst in command of the VLCC Bella 1, which was later renamed Marinera. Our coverage of the sentencing is here.
Of course, I should be covering Cadeler’s announcement of yet another massive wind turbine installation vessel (WTIV) order in China. The Danish wind player has confirmed an order with COSCO Shipping Offshore shipyard in Qidong, China, for the construction of two new WTIVs, scheduled for delivery in 2030 and 2031 at a contract price of US$929 million.
At the same time, Cadeler also announced what it described as “its strategic acquisition” of Menck for €501 million (US$580 million). Cadeler said that Menck is “a leading global provider of specialist equipment and technology solutions for offshore foundation installation (the solutions in question being hammering and pile driving, as I understand, but saying you are spending half a billion on a set of giant hammers sounds ridiculous).
The words “strategic acquisition” usually means that there is no industrial logic and no strong business case for the purchase at the price paid, and I suspect this may also be true in this case, especially as Menck was sold by Acteon, which is owned by private equity investors Buckthorn Partners and One Equity Partners.
Private equity is notorious for stripping businesses bare and flogging the carcasses for top dollar to the gullible (the Global Marine Group being a prime case in offshore). Cadeler says that it intends to continue operating Menck as a standalone business, preserving its independent market position while strengthening its role as a key supply chain provider across the offshore wind industry.
Regular readers of this column already know my view that Cadeler’s management has consistently overpromised and underdelivered, and that the company’s massive and growing debt burden is based on extremely optimistic forecasts that may or may not materialise.
And I should be covering Tidewater’s rather lacklustre second quarter results, which came out at the start of the month. For some reason, the shares have rallied to US$94 at close of Friday, up 68 per cent in a year and approaching the US$100 level at which all my warning lights flash. The share price rise prompted two people on the leadership team to sell hundreds of thousands of dollars of shares, as usual.
All you need to know is that the world’s largest OSV operator achieved net income for of just US$21.7 million, down from US$72.9 million in the corresponding period of 2025. That US$21.7 million equates to a profit of just US$1,255 per day per vessel in the period, on day rates of US$22,938 per day. The company disclosed that its plan to close on the US$500 million purchase of Wilson Sons UltraTug and its fleet of 22 platform supply vessels (PSVs) in Brazil has now slipped to around September 1.
Tidewater said that it generated US$67 million in net cash from operating activities and US$64.4 million in free cash flow during the quarter, around US$3,900 per day, which we can annualise to around US$1.5 million per vessel, across the 190 PSVs and anchor handlers. For a business worth US$4.6 billion in market capitalisation with vessels that will be harder to market when they reach 20 years of age in less than seven years, this seems a bit rich. But as usual, the people who are getting really rich are the management who can deliver lower profits for the shareholders but massive stock option benefits from the share price volatility.
For Tidewater, it is a case of bread today, jam tomorrow. But the company is generating cash, and holds a dominant market position.
The auction process for its smaller rival Seacor is rumoured to be underway, so let’s see if the Houston Pac-Man can gobble up another target.
Further reading
It’s a slow news month elsewhere in the world outside shipping, but one sharp-eyed reader did spot a gross error in our previous coverage of Saudi offshore support operators Rawabi, which we have corrected.
The company is by no means out of the woods in terms of its massive debt pile, unfortunately. We would anticipate some new external financing may be necessary to achieve any form of return to service for the company’s large laid-up fleet. Bahri may yet be called upon to perform resuscitation to Rawabi, and DP World is also rumoured to have been called upon to provide a bareboat-based solution to the Saudi shipowner’s problem of multiple laid-up OSVs for which funds do not exist to reactivate.
