DHT was formed and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 2005. At its inception, the Company acquired seven crude oil tankers, being three VLCCs and four Aframaxes, with long-term time charters attached. At year end 2007 and in early 2008, DHT acquired two Suezmax tankers that entered into long-term bareboat charters.
In March, 2010, the original company DHT Maritime, Inc. completed a series of transactions that resulted in DHT Holdings, Inc., a newly formed corporation organized in the Marshall Islands, becoming the publicly held parent company of DHT Maritime, Inc. As a result of the transactions, each shareholder of DHT Maritime, Inc. holds one share of DHT Holdings, Inc. common stock for each share of DHT Maritime, Inc. common stock held by such shareholder immediately prior to the series of transactions
In September 2010, DHT changed senior management with the Norwegian shipping partners Svein Moxnes Harfjeld and Trygve P. Munthe joining the company. The company subsequently set out on a strategic change from having been more of a “leasing type” business to become an operational ship owning company. The strategic change included building an efficient and competent organization in DHT’s wholly owned management companies.
In September 2014, DHT acquired 100% of the shares in Samco Shipholding, a then privately owned ship owning company based in Singapore. At the time of the transaction, Samco’s fleet consisted of seven VLCCs with an average age of 4.5 years and several of the ships with timecharter contracts to oil majors. Included in the transaction was Samco’s 50% ownership in Goodwood Ship Management, a ship management company based in Singapore.
In March 2017, DHT acquired BW Group’s VLCC fleet. The eleven ship transaction included two newbuilding contracts and represented a 50% expansion of DHT’s VLCC fleet at the time. BW Group is owned by the Sohmen Pao family and is one of the world’s largest maritime groups. The group’s predecessor companies are World-Wide Shipping and Bergesen d.y.. Through the transaction, BW Group became a significant shareholder in DHT.