Anglo International Shipping is that increasingly rare beast in today’s global shipping mix – a British shipowner that is happy to be based in the country, with offices in London and Cardiff, and proud to fly the UK flag on all its vessels.

CEO Steve Davies explains: “We have sought to build a British infrastructure around our organisation from the outset in support of the UK’s internationally recognised strengths in the maritime sector. Anglo International is a best practice and risk managed shipowner, committed to ensuring our business activities are return-focused for our investors, supportive of the personal objectives of our team, reliable and reputable for our charterers, and of value to our supply chain.”

The company was set up in 2017 by a group of shipping and finance market professionals with the stated mission of becoming the long-term dry bulk shipowner of choice for investors and charterers. Today it owns a fleet of eight dry bulk vessels totalling 818,000 dwt – six post-panamax vessels built 2010-2012 and two 2013-built kamsarmax vessels, all from major yards in China or Japan.

Prior to joining Anglo, Davies was CEO of the global maritime services arm of the Graig Shipping Group, involved in newbuilding supervision, shipmanagement and maritime consultancy. Graig was one of the pioneer overseas shipowners to have placed major newbuilding orders in China from the mid-1990s onwards for its successful Confidence and Diamond series of bulkers.

Davies also has the suitable intellectual credentials for his current CEO role, being a member of the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers and holding both an LLM in maritime law and a BSc in Economics.

Anglo’s guiding business model is explained with unusual clarity on the company website, which bears all he hallmarks of Davies’ authorship. “Backed by a growing private and institutional investor base with a counter-cyclical mindset, our strategy is to target attractive asset entry prices,” it says, “whilst maintaining a fortress balance sheet, manage a partnership-focused commercial employment strategy with top-tier counterparties, and maintain core shipping and finance expertise in-house.

“Anglo believes the capital landscape of dry bulk shipping has fundamentally shifted and requires a clean-sheet structure and full alignment of interests if investors, shipowners, charterers and suppliers are to work together to navigate through future shipping cycles.”

Davies elaborates on this in person by stressing that modern shipowners like Anglo must today embrace the environmental, social and governance (ESG) policies that are increasingly demanded by shareholders and institutional investors.

He is set to chair a panel discussion on the particular importance of the social component of ESG at the headline conference of this year’s London International Shipping Week, entitled ‘Driving Growth and Recovery in a Disrupted World’, to be held in hybrid format at the headquarters of the International Maritime Organization on Wednesday September 15.

“The Covid-19 pandemic has lifted the groundswell of ESG to a new level, because a complex combination of political, economic and social drivers have each faced significant additional disruption as a result,” explains Davies.

“If social values are seeing a significant disruption, we as business leaders should see the opportunity. We’d better take note and drive growth accordingly because resistance is not only futile, it’s arguably immoral.

“Almost everyone along the supply chain would like to know that what they are doing is driving positive social change.”

This article first appeared in the latest issue of Maritime CEO magazine. Splash readers can access the full magazine for free by clicking here.