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Navios Maritime’s swoop for three foreclosed newbuildings is just the start of a run of distressed asset deals between banks and publicly quoted shipowners, a leading analyst says.

“I hear the banks are circling, Fred.”

Angeliki Frangou-led Navios yesterday dived on three capesizes seized by Commerzbank in a move hailed as a master-stroke by observers.

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Hours later Nordea grabbed 13 vessels from the troubled Eastwind group and sold them on to Sammy Ofer's Samama.

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Urs Dur, an analyst at Lazard Capital Markets, said: “We expect more deals between banks and public owners.

“We believe that the involvement of foreclosed Commerzbank assets in this transaction is a likely example of many others that are brewing out there.”

Dur, who has a buy rating on Navios, raised his target price for the shipowner from $6 to $7 per share following the deal.

He continued: “We believe Navios Maritime has achieved a bit of a coup in acquiring ships at prices (approx. $81m apiece) that, with long-term charters attached (which remain hard to come by today at such lengths and rates), are closer to today’s depressed asset prices of $65m or so for a prompt charter free newbuild cape than the historically high prices at which these ships were ordered.

“However, we believe that other public players are looking at similar opportunities with more to be announced this summer.”

The Navios deal and Nordea’s raid at Eastwind came only days after TradeWinds warned financiers were sharpening their claws to deal with defaulting owners.

Bjorn Hojgaard, managing director of Thome Ship Management in Singapore, revealed his company had briefed several European and Scandinavian banks in recent weeks about the practical process and implications of taking control of vessels.

He said: “Banks are preparing to take over assets, and they are out there looking at what they would have to do. They are prepared."

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