Shipowners' structure and fleet distribution in the liquefied natural gas shipping market

The liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipping market has witnessed a rapid development over the last decade in line with the rising natural gas demand worldwide and the ongoing transformations in the globalising gas market. The purpose of this paper is to explore unique features of the LNG shipping market, more in particular to investigate shipowners' structure and fleet distribution. We specifically focus on the following research questions: Who are the market participants and what tanker ownership scenario is to be expected? How does the shipping market structure look like, in terms of number and size distribution of shipowners? Several concentration measures are applied to examine the latter question. Moreover, the characteristics of the LNG shipping market are further examined by looking at the fleet distribution. By answering the above questions, this paper aims to provide a deeper understanding of the current LNG shipping market.