A Tale of Two IPOs (In One Norwegian city)

Which company—a conventional shipping company or a ship leasing company—do you think raised more money from investors?

Mar 24, 2026

Shipping and stocks have an on-again, off-again relationship. Lately, it’s in the “off-again” status, with many shipping companies leaving stock exchanges. These shipping companies typically depart when large private investors (and often company insiders) bid to buy all the outstanding shares.

But this one-way tide pulling companies away from public markets suddenly reversed with not one, but two, shipping initial public offerings (IPOs) in Oslo in March 2026.

That said, these two companies’ strategies have little in common beyond their capital raise timing.

Company 1

Business model: Conventional shipping company
Fleet: Owns a fleet of oil tankers; has orders for new tankers (not yet built)
Competitors: Other shipping companies offering freight services to cargo customers

Company 2

Business model: Ship leasing company; provides financing solutions for other shipping companies
Fleet: Leases for multiple vessel types
Competitors: Commercial banks offering financing to shipping companies

Which company raised more money from investors?

Recent history would strongly suggest the ship leasing company raised more money than the conventional shipping company.

As we’ve discussed here on Freight + Fortune, most conventional public shipping companies trade at a discount to their net asset value (NAV), which means these companies’ liquidation value (what you’d be left with if you sold the fleet of vessels and paid off any outstanding debt) is higher than the valuation of the company itself, based on its market capitalization (share price multiplied by number of shares outstanding).

Poor valuation metrics lead to a vicious cycle where shipping companies don’t want to go public, since they’d immediately see the values of their fleet written down. So investors are skeptical to commit their capital knowing that there isn’t a reliable “floor” to underwrite their investment.

On the other hand, ship leasing—and ship finance—more broadly has seen a surge of interest amongst institutional investors as “private credit” has become the in-vogue asset class.

Banks that predominantly lent to shipowners withdrew from the space as their regulatory burdens increased. Non-bank finance providers (leasing companies, private credit funds, etc.) stepped in to fill the gap.

Non-bank finance providers can earn an attractive return on their capital with the protection of knowing that, if the shipping company should fail to make their payments on time, they can step in and seize the underlying collateral (which, for the purposes of this post, is a ship).

There was a clear rule of thumb as tanker earnings began to strengthen—and then war broke out in the Middle East.

Tanker earnings went parabolic, with stocks switching from trading at a discount to a premium over their NAV.
The broader private credit narrative that bolstered the capital raising of ship finance providers began showing cracks.
Auto-parts companies in the U.S. that had taken on a lot of debt from “non-bank” lenders fell into bankruptcy.
Investors started trying to pull their capital out of private credit funds, for fear that they could find themselves exposed to the next blow-up.

But this overarching story doesn’t translate over to the shipping industry.

Vessel owners, after enjoying record-high earnings, are awash in cash and have very little need to finance. This has led to a situation where both the supply and demand for non-bank capital in shipping has been slowing down.

So—within the current Middle East war context—which company raised more money from investors?

Company 1 (conventional shipping company Capital Tankers, sponsored by Evangelos Marinakis’ Capital Maritime) raised more than $500 million and Company 2 (ship leasing company Pelagic Credit, sponsored by the Abou Mehri and Hartmann families’ Pelagic Partners), raised $75 million.

While Capital Tankers is the capital raise winner, the biggest winner might be the Oslo stock exchange: the new home for both of these companies’ shares…despite the fact neither company is headquartered in Norway.