Funds investing in shipping has been the "talk of the town" over the past couple of years, as institutional investors, private equity and hedge funds have all emerged as newcomers to the shipping financing segment, often assuming the role of traditional shipping banks, which have exited the market, or cut their exposure. According to the latest weekly report from shipbroker Intermodal, the vast majority of those funds have been consumed in buying up shipping loans. "About $5 billion in shipping loans have changed hands in the past year and demand is driving loan prices to levels almost in line with book values", said the shipbroker.

According to an analysis by Intermodal's SnP broker George Dermatis, these funds "do not hesitate taking over entire fleets and even align themselves with several managers in an insatiable escapade to take over debts and even ships/assets on their balance sheets. Funds tolerate systemic risk much more than traditional banks that are massively exiting or reducing their exposure in the sector. So one could argue that one player is filling up the void the other creates. Therein lays the paradox" he noted.

Dermatis said that "the characteristics of traditional banks are undoubtedly much more to the liking of traditional shipowners; no exit strategy other than full debt repayment, name lending based on interpersonal relationships, which in some cases dates back decades, experience over several shipping cycles and the list goes on. The industry perceives this as an overall alignment of interests. Private Equity funds stand more or less at the other side of the road on all of these points and that creates nervousness to most being afraid of how fast these investors can climb the learning curve or lose their interest in the process".

According to the broker, "the truth is that shipping largely remains in the hands of its professionals, who live and breathe the essence of this sector and who -to a large extent-have assigned a negative connotation to the publicity that funds along with capital markets and OTC offerings gather. So, despite the fact that financing from these sources has in many times arrived when no other source of funding was available, the truth is that our industry still views them with skepticism. My personal feeling is that people spend too much time "loving or hating"a way of financing whose significance has been grossly overestimated-at least for the time being", Dermatis mentioned.

He went on to add that "despite the fact that numbers-especially last year's-are indeed impressive, it seems that equity funds do not contribute more than $6-7bn on average per year, which seems like a drop in the ocean when compared to conventional debt financing by banks which continues to provide around $250bn annually according to Marine Money. During the peak times of 2008, these figures stood close to $500bn and this should therefore be sufficient to hush down fears that private equity alone could lead to a bubble or that it could even distort market reality.The main worry linked to overcapacity remains and the finance gap on newbuilding orders persists if not broadens. The latest available data speaks of figures of over $125bn.Whilst the presence of "new" money is duly noted, we all need to realize that the industry must be able to carry its own weight. If that means changing our processes, transparency levels, corporate responsibility standards, etc. in order to bridge this gap and attract a greater share of their attention, then maybe this is a change we should embrace", Dermatis concluded.

Meanwhile, in the dry bulk market this past week, things continued to improve on the back of rates for the smaller size segments holding on to their levels and those for Capes correcting upwards, said Intermodal, while the spill-overs of the improved sentiment have yet to affect the Panamax market. Nevertheless, the BDI ended yesterday on yet another higher note, ending the session at 1,222 points.