Splash247: Transport Capital-backed Seahawk moves into vessel lending

Published by Splash247

Frankfurt-based investment manager Seahawk Investments has moved into direct ship lending with the launch of a Luxembourg maritime credit fund targeting smaller and mid-sized owners that have found access to traditional bank finance increasingly selective.

The Transport Capital-backed firm has launched the Seahawk Maritime Credit Fund (SMCF), a Luxembourg-domiciled reserved alternative investment fund, with its first sub-fund backed by an unnamed maritime family office. Seahawk did not disclose the size of the vehicle or its return target.

The fund will provide senior secured loans and financial leases backed by commercial maritime assets, with individual loan tenors of as much as seven years.

Its mandate is broad, stretching across containerships, bulkers, product and chemical tankers, crude tankers, LPG carriers, ro-ro and car carriers, offshore support vessels including AHTS, PSVs and CTVs, as well as intermodal equipment. The main targets are smaller and mid-sized shipping companies and maritime investors looking for leverage.

Seahawk is pitching the strategy at a part of the market that remains less well served despite a broader recovery in bank appetite for shipping.

Splash reported in July that lending by the world’s top 40 shipping banks increased 6% last year to $300.6bn, the first meaningful recovery after years of consolidation. Petrofin estimates total bank lending to shipping at around $425bn and the wider finance market, including leasing, export finance and alternative capital, at approximately $680bn.

The rebound, however, has not been evenly spread. Petrofin noted that banks are becoming more cautious on loan-to-value ratios and increasingly focused on financially stronger borrowers as ship prices remain elevated. Société Générale has similarly described 2026 as a well-supplied ship finance market overall, while noting that smaller owners are increasingly tapping private credit funds.

It is into that gap that Seahawk is moving. The fund said it will take an anti-cyclical approach focused on relatively generic and liquid assets with transparent secondhand values rather than concentrating on a single vessel segment. Transactions can be structured under English, Norwegian, Danish and Dutch law.

The move also puts Seahawk alongside a growing group of non-bank lenders targeting the same corner of maritime finance.

Splash reported last year that Pelagic Partners’ MareVia Credit Fund had completed its first transaction, financing three multipurpose vessels under five-year bareboat arrangements. Earlier this year, Eurazeo secured a €175m ($204m) first closing for its second sustainable maritime infrastructure fund, which also provides senior secured asset-backed financing to small and mid-sized European shipowners.

Seahawk has brought in veteran shipping banker Michael de Visser to build the new business. De Visser joined the company in August as managing director and head of credit investments after more than 30 years in credit, including a decade heading shipping at Dutch lender NIBC Bank and a spell as senior adviser to Transport Capital.

The appointment brings him back together with Transport Capital, where he had been advising since 2024. Transport Capital was set up in Singapore in 2013 by Philip Clausius and other former First Ship Lease executives and has since built businesses spanning maritime investment, corporate finance, asset management and shipbroking. Clausius previously oversaw around $1bn of maritime asset acquisitions, financing and deployment during his decade at First Ship Lease.

Transport Capital is the majority shareholder of Seahawk, which was established in 2018 as the group’s regulated investment management arm. Seahawk already runs an equity long-short strategy focused on transport and energy and a credit opportunities fund investing principally in transportation, energy and utilities debt. The new vehicle takes the platform a step further by moving directly into loans and leases secured against ships and other maritime assets.

Universal Investment Luxembourg will serve as alternative investment fund manager and administrator, with DZ Privatbank as depositary, Arendt & Medernach as legal counsel and Deloitte as auditor.