Shipbuilding Order Wave Extends as Owners Pay Up for 2028-2030 Delivery Slots
Contracting stayed heavy with roughly 83 fresh orders in the week to October 7 and 147 recorded in week 40, as owners booked VLCCs, LR2 product tankers, gas carriers and bulkers at firm prices with delivery out to 2029 and 2030.
Tanker contracting remained one of the strongest areas of the market. Scorpio Tankers returned to the VLCC sector with two 306,000 dwt units at Hengli Heavy Industries in Dalian for delivery in September 2028, with individual newbuilding indications near $135 million per ship while other market estimates suggested values approaching $175 million each. X-Press Feeders booked three 157,000 dwt tankers at Penglai Jinglu Ship Industry at about $80 million each for December 2028 delivery, with options for three more that could take the programme to six vessels. YZJ Maritime contracted six 114,000 dwt LR2 product tankers at Jiangsu Haifeng Shipbuilding at roughly $79.5 million each, deliverable from March 2029, in a series that could extend to eight ships and that marks the yard's return to commercial shipbuilding after operations had been suspended.
Gas and dry bulk added to the tally. SFL Corporation ordered two 93,000 cubic metre very large ammonia carriers for about $216 million, with delivery from the second quarter of 2028 and long-term time charters to a European investment-grade oil major that add a minimum of about $162 million to its fixed-rate charter backlog. ADNOC Logistics & Services committed $324 million to three 90,000 cubic metre very large gas carriers for delivery in the second half of 2029 under seven-year contracts with ADNOC Global Trading. In dry bulk, Precious Shipping returned to the newbuilding market after two years with four 64,500 dwt Ultramax bulkers at Taizhou Sanfu at about $35.45 million each, against a Clarkson benchmark of roughly $35.5 million for the size, up from $33.25 million a year earlier.
Prices are edging higher even as owners complain about cost, and the forward picture is filling up. Weekly industry data recorded 147 newbuilding orders across nine segments in week 40 with combined capacity of 3.47 million deadweight tonnes, and newbuilding prices continued to edge up while average lead times stayed close to 3.5 years. The global orderbook has expanded by roughly 25% year on year to around 225 million compensated gross tonnes, equal to about 23% of the existing fleet compared with approximately 52% in 2008, with Chinese yards accounting for more than 65% of the book. Yard output is expected to accelerate to around 64 million CGT in 2027 and 69 million CGT in 2028, setting up fleet growth of roughly 6% a year across 2027 and 2028.
The result is an unusually long forward book at still-elevated prices. Owners are committing capital against delivery positions three years out while recycling stays exceptionally low despite an ageing fleet, which leaves demolition as the main balancing mechanism if freight markets weaken once the current orderbook delivers. Container capacity is projected to rise about 9% in 2027 and 12% in 2028, LPG carrier capacity about 16% and 8%, and tanker fleet growth is expected to strengthen toward roughly 6% in 2027 and 7% in 2028.