The Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) has been busy in the second-hand vessel market adding six container ships to its fleet, according to shipbroking reports.
The Swiss-based carrier, already the second largest shipping company in the world, has bought the vessels from German owner Zeaborn, according to Greece-based shipbroker, Allied. Its weekly market report says that MSC has acquired the 8,200TEU ER Tianping, ER Tianshan, ER Tokyo and ER Texas along with the 7,900TEU ER Vancouver and ER Yokohama.
The first four boxships were built by Hyundai Samho and were sold for US$28.5 million each, while the other two were built in the Hyundai Heavy Industries shipyard and were sold for US$22 million each, said the report.
Additionally, the UK-based shipbroker, Braemar, noted that MSC, which has the 16% of the world’s container ship fleet, has also acquired the 5,600TEU vessel Greenwich Bridge built by Hyundai Heavy Industries for US$14 million.
The Geneva-headquartered box line has narrowed the gap to the largest container shipping company in the world, Maersk Line, to approximately 250,000TEU, according to Alphaliner. In particular, MSC’s total capacity now stands at more than 3.8 million TEU, which translates to 800,000TEU+ larger than the total capacity of Chinese COSCO, the third largest shipping company.
Antonis Karamalegkos
Editor
