Superfast Ferries

ANEK ferry company and Elefsis Shipyards are in discussions for the execution of a 1-billion-euro shipbuilding budget program for the modernization of the Attica Group fleet.

Panagiotis Panagopoulos, a leader in Greek coastal shipping, has died, his family announced on Tuesday. He was 83 years old.

Born in Athens in 1935, Panagopoulos studied at Switzerland's Ecole Superieur de Commerce and then went on to work in Genoa and London at the Home Lines cruise company, owned by shipping magnate and family friend Eugenios Eugenides.

If Greek coastal shipping giant Attica Group, which operates Blue Star, Superfast Ferries and Hellenic Seaways, were to be put up for sale in future, Italy's Grimaldi Group would be interested in buying the Athens-listed group.

Italian group Grimaldi is preparing to send a complaint to the competition department of the European Commission (DG Comp) against what it sees as the threat of concentration conditions in the Greek coastal shipping sector.

Greek authorities have detained a 22-year-old Belgian woman on terrorism charges following a tip-off by Italian police that she had boarded a ferry to Corfu on Friday night.

A new round of restructuring is under way in the Greek coastal shipping industry, with its catalyst being the tender by Piraeus Bank for the sale of a 40.44 percent stake in Hellenic Seaways (HSW) that belongs to the lender's portfolio.