When Britannia Bulk, a London-based specialist in moving coal from the Baltic to the UK, listed on the New York Stock Exchange in June, its prospects seemed golden. The company’s business model, under which it chartered vessels from other companies to add to the modestly sized fleet it owned directly, made it flexible and let it respond rapidly to changing markets, the prospectus said.

However, on October 31, less than five months after the stock exchange listing valued its shares at $404m, Britannia Bulk put its main trading subsidiary into administration.