SHIPOWNERS have not been public figures since the heyday of the Golden Greeks. Few outside the industry will ever have heard of Gianluigi Aponte or, for that matter, Mediterranean Shipping Company.

And to be fair, he seems to like it that way. This man is famously publicity shy, preferring a quiet life to ostentatiously courting Jackie Kennedy on board a succession of ever more extravagant superyachts in full view of the paparazzi.

Yet despite his carefully cultivated low profile, his position in container shipping - now the backbone of world trade — makes him every bit as powerful as the tanker tycoons of old.

MSC started from scratch as a breakbulk operator in 1970, branching into container carriage in the early 1980s. Over the intervening decades, it steadily grew to outstrip Maersk, which until a few years back looked untouchable.

The masterplan to build a shipping behemoth was obviously deliberate and may have had a touch of empire-building about it. MSC has picked up almost 300 secondhand containerships since 2020, including 65 in 2023 and reportedly 20 in the year to date. That’s five or six a week.

‘We don’t want to be the biggest for the sake of it’ is a staple interview cliché trotted out by owners of businesses that topple rivals for the top slot. But as well as bringing the benefits that go with the resultant market clout, being number one in anything is always gratifying to the ego.

In the past, octogenarians typically considered it time to take things easy. But as the unexpected bid for Gram Car Carriers unveiled this week indicates, 83-year-old Aponte does not lack further ambition.

Assuming everything goes through smoothly, MSC subsidiary SAS Shipping Agencies Services will gain control of the third-largest provider of pure car and truck carriers to vehicle carrier operators, with a fleet that will powerfully augment the two 7,000 car capacity PCTCs MSC already owns.

At first sight, the $700m offer appears slightly curious. Paying a 28% premium on the prevailing share price looks a bit of a gamble at a time when some observers argue the car carrier market has peaked. Certainly, existing GCC shareholders F. Laeisz, Al Maritime Holding and others were happy to recommend the deal with alacrity.

But the sums involved represent a single digit percentage of Aponte’s cash pile, which was hugely boosted by astonishing piles of money boxship outfits raked in during the pandemic. His estimated net worth, according to the Forbes billionaires index, currently tops $30bn.

This simply isn’t a big spend for someone with pockets that deep. He makes five or six times more than what he plans to spend here in interest alone, every year.

Moreover, other liner companies also see car carriers as the way to go. Remember that CMA CGM took delivery of a second long-term chartered 7,000 car capacity ship last February, with another two on order.

There is also the asset play angle. GCC’s cash flow is enough to reduce the value of the ships to an acceptable level in a few years’ time, and Aponte can trade them until they are 30-35 years old. Essentially he’s buying steel, a trick at which he has always excelled.

Extending the life of secondhand tonnage has always been an MSC stock-in-trade. It ordered its first newbuildings only in 1994.

Most of his recent boxship buys were getting on a bit, at up to 20 years, and some were due special surveys, which were only carried out after the purchase. That’s always a handy argument when haggling over vessel values.

MSC’s unstoppable acquisition juggernaut has already made big strides towards diversification, with the pace picking up notably in recent years.

The company first moved into other vessel types with the purchase of Lauro Lines in 1989, which gave it control of two old steam turbine cruiseships. One of them was Achille Lauro (IMO: 5390008), which had earlier in the decade become famous for all the wrong reasons. MSC Cruises, as it was rebranded, is now the third-largest cruise operator in the world.

In 2020, MSC purchased a stake in ro-ro cargoship operator Messina Line. This was always something of an opportunist transaction, with most of the ro-ros subsequently sold off at a big profit.

There have also been inroads into the Mediterranean ferry market, with the acquisition of Grandi Navi Veloci in 2010 and a 49% stake in rival Moby Lines in 2023.

Outside of shipping, MSC entered airfreight in 2022, in a tie up with Atlas Air, and now owns four Boeing 777 freighters. It has bought Bolloré Africa, which has large terminal investments across that continent through Terminal Investments Ltd. Last month it acquired French forwarder Clasquin.

In sum, MSC now controls a vast logistics infrastructure. Cars are ultimately just another type of cargo, so moving into the space by buying GCC makes for a fair fit with existing interests.

But here’s the bigger point. If anyone else were buying GCC, it would be just another middleweight M&A agreement. But this is Aponte, and everyone in shipping pays attention to what Aponte does. Particularly if it doesn’t make immediate sense.

Aponte is the shipowner’s shipowner. That doesn’t mean he always gets it right. But it’s a brave person who bets against him.