SINGAPORE (18 Dec 2025) — Yangzijiang Shipbuilding (Holdings) Ltd (SGX: BS6) has spent 2025 doing two things at once: delivering ships (and earnings) at scale, while rebuilding order momentum after an extraordinary 2024. The result is a stock that keeps pulling in both “quality cyclicals” buyers and “shipbuilding-supercycle” believers—often on the same day.
On 18 Dec 2025, the counter traded around S$3.48, down about 1.14% on the session after moving between S$3.46 and S$3.57, with roughly 7.93 million shares traded (market data). [1]
But the bigger story isn’t a one-day wiggle. It’s the tension between a gigantic, long-dated order book and the market’s question for 2026: how much fresh ordering (and at what margin) will the next cycle bring?
The headline fundamental: Order book US$22.83 billion, deliveries out to 2030
Yangzijiang’s latest disclosed figures show an outstanding order book of 245 vessels with total contract value of about US$22.83 billion, stretching across 2025 to 2030 deliveries. [2]
Two details matter for stock-watchers:
- “Green” vessels account for ~71% of total order book value, a crucial datapoint as shipowners increasingly pay up for cleaner propulsion and future-proofed designs. [3]
- Containerships dominate: 126 containerships represent about US$16.21 billion of the order book value in the company’s breakdown. [4]
In other words: the backlog is not just large—it is skewed toward higher-specification, regulation-driven replacement demand, which can matter for pricing power and yard utilisation.
New orders in 2025: Lower than 2024—but showing a “second-half thaw”
The number that initially disappointed investors earlier in 2025 was order wins. By mid-November, Yangzijiang disclosed year-to-date order wins of about US$2.17 billion, largely small to mid-sized vessels slated for 2027–2029 delivery. [5]
That is dramatically below the comparable pace of 2024, which was inflated by a surge in containership contracting across the industry. The Business Times noted the US$2.2b YTD figure was about one-fifth of the US$11.6b order wins recorded over the same period in 2024. [6]
Still, the composition and timing are worth noticing. Seatrade Maritime summarised the 2025 order wins as 50 newbuilding orders including 38 container ships, 10 bulk carriers, and two 40,000 cbm LPG carriers. [7]
This fits the pattern many yards are seeing: buyers hesitate, then return when freight visibility, financing conditions, and regulation pathways become clearer.
Deliveries: On track against FY2025 target (the part the market tends to reward)
If orders are the forward-looking “story,” deliveries are the profit-realisation engine—and Yangzijiang’s latest update points to steady execution.
As of mid-November (the company’s disclosed cut-off), Yangzijiang had delivered 46 vessels year-to-date, achieving about 82% of its FY2025 target of 56 vessels. [8]
For a shipbuilder, this matters because timely delivery is where contract milestones convert into revenue recognition, cash collection, and (when the cycle is favourable) margin.
Earnings power check: 1H2025 net profit RMB4.18b and higher shipbuilding margins
Yangzijiang’s 1H2025 results help explain why investors have been reluctant to fade the name even when order headlines cooled.
For the six months ended 30 June 2025, the group reported net profit of RMB4.177 billion (cash flow statement line item), up from RMB3.059 billion in 1H2024. [9]
The company also reported basic EPS of 106.02 RMB cents for 1H2025 (vs 77.42 RMB cents in 1H2024) and a higher net asset value per share at mid-year. [10]
Operationally, the interim filing showed the shipbuilding segment margin improving (shipbuilding margin presented at 35% in 1H2025 versus 26% in 1H2024), with shipbuilding turnover at about RMB12,249 million. [11]
That combination—high utilisation + favourable contract mix + margin uplift—is the core reason the stock continues to trade like a “cycle winner,” not just another industrial.
Dividend context: FY2024 final dividend proposed at 12.0 Singapore cents
Income-focused investors keep an eye on Yangzijiang because it has been returning more cash in recent cycles.
In its FY2024 results, the company proposed a final exempt (one-tier) ordinary dividend of 12.0 Singapore cents per share, up from 6.5 Singapore cents in the prior year’s final dividend. [12]
The same FY2024 filing shows basic EPS of 167.91 RMB cents for 2024 (vs 103.82 RMB cents in 2023), illustrating how strong the prior-year earnings base was going into 2025. [13]
Dividends don’t “guarantee” anything in shipbuilding (nothing does), but they do affect valuation narratives—especially when investors are comparing cyclicals across SGX.
Risk spotlight: Contract termination tied to alleged sanctions circumvention
One of the more unusual (and market-relevant) headlines in 2025 was Yangzijiang’s disclosure around compliance risk.
In a 27 Sep 2025 SGX announcement, the company said subsidiaries terminated contracts for four 50,000 DWT MR oil tankers with an aggregate contract value of about US$180 million after critical information emerged alleging the buyer’s sole shareholder was involved in a scheme to circumvent U.S. sanctions laws and regulations. [14]
Key details from the filing:
- No revenue or profit related to the contracts had been recognised up to 30 June 2025. [15]
- A 10% deposit (US$18m) had been received at signing, and an additional US$4.48m instalment was collected for the one vessel where construction began. [16]
- The company stated the termination was not expected to have a material impact on NTA and EPS for FY2025. [17]
Media coverage echoed the market’s takeaway: the dollar value was meaningful enough to make headlines, but not enough to redefine the investment case on its own. [18]
For investors, the broader implication is this: as geopolitics and sanctions regimes tighten, counterparty screening and contract enforceability become part of shipyard risk management—not just steel prices and labour costs.
Analyst forecasts as of 18 Dec 2025: Targets cluster in the high S$3s to mid S$4s
By 18 Dec 2025, published consensus snapshots point to analysts still leaning constructive—though the exact upside depends heavily on the data source and coverage universe.
SGX-sourced consensus (via Beansprout / Growbeansprout):
- Consensus share price target: S$4.502 (as of 18 Dec 2025), implying about 28.3% upside from a referenced price of S$3.51 on the page. [19]
Investing.com consensus snapshot:
- Average 12-month target: ~S$3.805 (11 analysts), showing ~9.33% upside from the referenced price. [20]
- Investing.com lists an overall consensus rating of “Strong Buy” (10 buy, 1 sell, 0 hold) and shows a high estimate around S$4.51 (with a much lower tail estimate also displayed). [21]
- The same page also displays selected broker entries and dates (for example, Citi “Buy” with a target shown at S$4.20 dated Nov 19, 2025, among others). [22]
TipRanks snapshot:
- Average price target shown around S$3.93, with a high forecast around S$4.53 and low around S$3.56 (as displayed on the page). [23]
Why the spread? Aggregators can differ on which broker notes are included, how recently targets were updated, and whether targets are normalised across listings/tickers. The useful signal is the shape of expectations: analysts generally still price in upside, but they’re implicitly debating whether 2024’s order environment was an outlier or a template.
The 2026 playbook: What long-term investors are actually watching
Yangzijiang Shipbuilding stock tends to move on a few “repeat offender” variables. Into 2026, the watchlist is pretty clear:
Order momentum vs. yard capacity
- Management has highlighted limited delivery slots industry-wide, and Yangzijiang has said it remains focused on filling remaining 2029 delivery slots with smaller to mid-sized vessels. [24]
- Investors will watch whether new orders accelerate without sacrificing pricing discipline.
Margin durability
- The 1H2025 numbers showed stronger shipbuilding margins and robust earnings—great outcomes that are harder to sustain if competition heats up or input costs rise. [25]
“Green vessel” mix
- With ~71% of order book value described as green vessels, the bet is that regulatory pressure translates into steady replacement demand and defensible margins. [26]
Geopolitics and compliance
- The September contract termination shows how sanctions-related risk can become financially and reputationally material—even when the immediate earnings hit is limited. [27]
Capital returns
- The step-up in FY2024’s proposed final dividend (12 cents) has kept the “shareholder return” narrative alive, but shipbuilding dividends remain inherently cyclical. [28]
Bottom line for 18 Dec 2025
As of 18 Dec 2025, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding (SGX: BS6) sits in a familiar-but-interesting place:
- A massive US$22.8b backlog extends earnings visibility into 2030. [29]
- Deliveries are tracking plan, supporting near-term profit realisation. [30]
- Order wins are lower than 2024’s surge, but evidence of improving sentiment has shown up in late-2025 updates. [31]
- Analyst target prices (depending on source) broadly imply single- to double-digit upside, with some higher consensus estimates pointing to more substantial potential appreciation. [32]
Shipbuilding is never a calm sea. But if there’s a “boring” superpower in this sector, it’s converting long backlogs into on-time deliveries and sustained margins—exactly the set of datapoints Yangzijiang investors will keep interrogating as the market turns the page into 2026.
References
1. www.investing.com, 2. links.sgx.com, 3. links.sgx.com, 4. links.sgx.com, 5. links.sgx.com, 6. www.businesstimes.com.sg, 7. www.seatrade-maritime.com, 8. links.sgx.com, 9. links.sgx.com, 10. links.sgx.com, 11. links.sgx.com, 12. links.sgx.com, 13. links.sgx.com, 14. links.sgx.com, 15. links.sgx.com, 16. links.sgx.com, 17. links.sgx.com, 18. www.straitstimes.com, 19. growbeansprout.com, 20. www.investing.com, 21. www.investing.com, 22. www.investing.com, 23. www.tipranks.com, 24. www.businesstimes.com.sg, 25. links.sgx.com, 26. links.sgx.com, 27. links.sgx.com, 28. links.sgx.com, 29. links.sgx.com, 30. links.sgx.com, 31. www.businesstimes.com.sg, 32. www.investing.com
