Fraser Yachts Overview of the Global Superyacht Brokerage Market

    MONACO, September 25, 2014 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Leading superyacht brokerage Fraser Yachts announces strong sales across all divisions at the 2014 Monaco Yacht Show this morning.

Brokerage

2014 has seen the yacht brokerage market continue to improve in terms of units sold. April, May and June were particularly strong months this year with over 40 units being sold each month. While Fraser Yachts bucked the trend and continued to sell well in July as well, with five units being sold in just one ten day period alone.

This year has also seen a number of larger yachts sold, with 15 units over 60m sold already, and five of these over 70m, just under the same figures for the whole of 2013.

Despite these large yachts being sold the average asking price has fallen from 7.6million Euros in 2013 to 6.6million Euros indicating that the market is still adjusting and sellers are becoming more realistic about their asking prices.

In terms of the most popular brands being sold in the brokerage market, Sunseeker remains at the top, with 25 units sold compared to Feadship's 15 and Benetti's 11 units.

Overall Fraser Yachts remains in the lead of the yacht brokerage houses for yacht sales completed this year, the fifth year in a row it has done so. In the last five years we have closed 37% more deals than our closest competitor. We have also sold more yachts through in house deals than any other yacht brokerage house.

New Construction

In the new yacht construction market the figures are particularly good. The new orders reported in 2014 have grown in both Q1 and Q2 by an average 57% compared to Q1 & Q2 of 2013 (60 units sold as opposed to 38).

Italy still holds the first place for quantity of new yacht orders placed this year with the US having the second highest number of new orders. The largest order was placed at Benetti with their recent signing of a 100m+ project, although the average length of these new orders is 43.5m. In terms of actual units currently under construction Italy remains in the lead, followed by The Netherlands.

Deliveries and launches have definitely shown a significant growth in 2014 with an increase of +26% and +5% respectively.

One of the largest yachts currently under construction to be sold this year was the 88m Illusion, being built at Pride Mega Yachts in China, Fraser Yachts was delighted to be acting for the shipyard in this deal.

Charter

Charter Management is enjoying a great year with real growth being seen on 2013 figures and solid forward bookings already being taken for the 2015 season which is significantly earlier than previous years. Our superyacht charter fleet has also welcomed over 20 new yachts into the fleet in the last 9 months, the yachts come from owners based all over the world, including a number from South America which is a new trend. This clearly demonstrates the trust placed in our Charter Marketing team to achieve the results that our yacht owners expect. This is also reinforced by the fact that a large number of our yacht charter fleet have now been with us for nearly ten years.

We have also seen a significant increase in charters in remote locations such as Alaska and Tahiti and we expect this trend to continue as owners seek to explore new experiences and more yachts designed for these remote explorations are launched.

The winter season is already looking strong with the majority of our Caribbean based yacht charter fleet already booked for the peak Christmas/New Year holiday period.

In terms of charter bookings at Fraser Yachts we have seen a 30% increase in the value of bookings made through charter retail, and nearly 20% increase in the value of bookings made on our charter managed fleet.

Yacht Management

This has been a good year so far for yacht management. The introduction in late 2013 of the Maritime Labour Convention kept our people busy in the early part of this year, but having allocated dedicated resources to preparing ourselves and our clients for this we were well placed to ensure a smooth launch to our fleet. In new business we are seeing relatively steady growth in Yacht Management. In this context we see somewhat more activity in our American market than we are currently seeing in the European market, particularly in the last quarter compared to 2013. Whether this is due to concerns relating to the Middle East and in the Ukraine is not confirmed but certainly suspected.

Crew

The Crew Network continues to operate very successful offices in Fort Lauderdale, Antibes and Viareggio in Italy. As was the case with yacht management we allocated resources in 2013 to ensure that our superyacht crew arm would be fully compliant with the Maritime Labour Convention by the time it was first introduced. Whilst this required a considerable amount of work it has paid off with clean audits of all our operations. Interestingly we are finding that savvy Captains and crew are starting to ask the question if we are compliant with MLC when they register or visit with us. Business wise year to date we are seeing a lift in the number of jobs posted by around 6% to 2013. This is a positive sign and we have recently increased staff numbers to ensure we continue to provide for this whilst maintaining the highest level of service.

Fraser Yachts is the world's leading, full-service yachting company, and provides a professional team of yachting experts ready to support, advise and to assist you in every aspect of superyacht charter, luxury yacht sales, yacht ownership, and day-to-day operation. Visit their website at www.fraseryachts.com for further information.

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