COSCO Disposes Of Four More Oldies

Hong-Kong listed shipping company China COSCO Holdings Company Limited has disassembled four more vessels within its fleet modernization efforts that call for scrapping of aged fleet.

The quartet is comprised of two container vessels (Xiu He and Ya He) and two bulk carriers (Tianfu Hai and Ming Hai). The units were sent for disassembling from 1 April 2015 to 30 April 2015.

The vessels, with the aggregate capacity of 261.8 thousand deadweight tons, were disposed of at a total consideration of approximately RMB 65 million.

According to the unaudited financial results of the company for the month ended 30 April 2015, realized losses incurred from the disassembly of the vessels amounted to approximately RMB 59
million.

The two decommissioned container vessels were previously owned by COSCO Container Lines Co., Ltd (COSCON), and the two decommissioned bulk carriers were previously owned by China COSCO Bulk Shipping (Group) Company Limited (COSCO Bulk), both wholly-owned subsidiaries of the company.

The move comes following a major decommissioning spree that saw COSCO disassemble fourteen vessels, including one containership and thirteen bulk carriers, from 1 February 2015 to 31 March 2015.

Together with the latest decommissioning, COSCO has dismantled around 40 vessels just this year, including 17 in January and 8 in February.

“The board considers that the decommissioning of the vessels is conducive to enhancing the overall operational competitiveness of the shipping fleet of the company and is in the interest of the company and the shareholders as a whole,” COSCO said.