Tanker Owners Scrap Most Ships in Decades as IMO 2020 Looms

Oil tanker owners are giving up.

A 19-month curtailment of OPEC cargoes, and environmental regulations that are proving uneconomical to comply with, have got owners purging the supertanker fleet at the fastest pace since the 1980s, according to Global Marketing Systems Inc., one of the world’s top buyers of obsolete ships for scrap.

While the demolition surge—sending vessels to be ripped apart on the beaches of India and Bangladesh—reflects the worst charter rates for owners in decades, scrapping often helps set the stage for market recoveries. Morgan Stanley estimates that the global fleet of so-called very large crude carriers could ...