Sale & Purchase (S&P)
The secondhand market for trading existing ships, and the desk that brokers those transactions.
- Category
- Markets and Pricing
- Abbreviation
- S&P
- Last reviewed
How it works
Sale & Purchase (S&P) is the market for buying and selling secondhand vessels, as opposed to newbuilding (ordering ships from a yard) or demolition (selling for scrap). An S&P broker matches buyers and sellers and negotiates the memorandum of agreement.
Reported S&P sale prices, normalised per deadweight tonne by class and age, are the comparable data behind asset valuation. We use booked S&P transactions to drive our vessel valuation model and S&P benchmarks.
Where it shows up on The Maritime
Also known as: S&P, sale and purchase, secondhand sale.
Related terms
Automated Valuation Model (AVM)
A model that estimates a ship’s market value from recent sales of comparable vessels.
Demolition
The sale of a ship at the end of her life for recycling, priced per light displacement tonne (LDT).
Newbuilding
A ship ordered new from a shipyard, and the forward orderbook of such vessels that signals future fleet supply.
Deadweight Tonnage (DWT)
The total weight a ship can carry (cargo plus fuel, stores, crew and water) at her load line, in metric tonnes.
More markets and pricing terms
A plain-English reference definition: our own explanation of a standard shipping concept, not a licensed source or legal advice. See the full glossary or the broader maritime dictionary.
Last reviewed: .