With charter rates continuing to climb , there is an ongoing shortage of tonnage available to ship recyclers, cash buyer GMS has reported.
Dry bulk carriers, Capes and even Panamax sectors reported rising rates last week.
“Q1 2025 is proving itself to be somewhat of a turbulent time given that more than $150/LDT has now been wiped off vessel highs since January 2024 where a container breached the now long-forgotten $600/LDT mark, and ongoing economic / trade pressures continue to push vessel prices down while hampering sentiments and aggression from the various ship recycling destinations, despite an omnipresent demand permeating at new lows”, GMS said.
Indeed, ship recycling sales have slowed so much that most yards are now either concentrating on recycling their recent deliveries.
GMS also noted that ship recycling yards that remained determined to continue operations were busy upgrading their facilities ahead of the Hong Kong Convention’s (HKC) entry into force on June 26th this year.