Rent a supertanker or a fun nite at the Burj Al-Arab = cost about the same day rate...

Owners of supertankers, losing money for a sixth consecutive quarter, will probably idle the most ships in more than two decades as they contend with a glut that drove charter rates to the lowest in at least 14 years.

The combination of too many ships and slowing demand growth for oil means that about 6 percent of the fleet will be anchored in a year from almost none now, according to the median in a Bloomberg survey of eight brokers and analysts. That may not be enough to end the slump. Forward freight agreements, traded by brokers and used to bet on transport costs, anticipate rates no higher than $13,819 a day through 2013.


Frontline Ltd., the biggest operator of the vessels, says it needs $29,800 to break even. The Hamilton, Bermuda-based company will report its biggest annual loss in 12 years in 2011, analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg show. While owners can cut operating costs to as little as $2,000 a day from $12,000 by anchoring ships, it also means no income, said Andreas Sohmen- Pao, chief executive officer of the oil and gas shipping unit of BW Group Ltd., which is idling three vessels.

“When it’s this bad, eventually it wears people down a bit and some do get out of the market,” said Martin Stopford, the London-based managing director of Clarkson Research Services Ltd., a unit of the world’s biggest shipbroker. “To lay the ship up, you would eventually have to totally lose confidence in the market improving for some time.”