Tor Olav Trøim says the best indicator of world economy is the containership index.
Container outlook cheery as charter rates flatline
Thursday 20 March 2008
Katrin Berkenkopf, Cologne
WITH the Easter holidays coming up, the container vessel charter market seems to have taken a break, writes Katrin Berkenkopf in Cologne.
Brokers noted little activity or, as Braemar Seascope put it: “a week of consolidation passes”.
Indices remained almost unchanged. Braemar’s BOXi was flat at 161.55 points, down 0.01 points. The Hamburg ConTex index reached 1,006 points, up from 1,005. The CV1100 type showed a slight downward tendency, while the B170 and 2,500 types were slightly up.
Brokers suggested that ER Schiffahrt has found a new charterer for three, 2000-built 5,700 teu ships when their Maersk charter finishes at the end of this year. They will reportedly be taken up by MSC for four years at $39,000 per day. The fixture is unconfirmed and is yet be signed.
Generally, there are more optimistic forecasts for the bigger sizes than for the smaller ships in the market. “Owners of smaller ships will be keen to see rates increase for their ships, but this seems unlikely in the short-term,” Braemar said.
“At the risk of sounding repetitive, there is no major sentiment in either bullish or bearish direction at the moment,” DnB Nor Markets said in a note on the shipping markets. “Those exposed to the container shipping market are still advised to keep a keen eye on the state of the world economy.”
Despite this week’s stock market turbulence around the world, Michael Frenzel, chief executive of Hapag-Lloyd parent company, Tui, said that he did not expect global trade to take a strong dip.
A leading German shipping banker has also given an optimistic outlook for container market development, even though the orderbook remains enormous.
Jürgen Bentlage, head of Deutsche Schiffsbank, said delivery lead times were much longer than they used to be some years ago. If growth rates on the demand side continued at recent levels, this additional tonnage can be absorbed, he said.
Slow steaming to cut rising fuel costs is becoming a persistent phenomenon with liner companies, providing additional impetus for demand.
Although there is concern about the US economic slowdown, Mr Bentlage said that the container trades nowadays are far less dependent on developments there, while Europe-Asia trades are more important.
“But it might be good if trees don’t grow sky-high for a while, so that new orders will slow down a bit,” he added, with regard to future rates. That would help the market in absorbing the new tonnage.
According to data from AXS-Alphaliner, the global container fleet has reached the capacity milestone of 12m teu this week, made up of 5,823 vessels.
The analysts expect the 13m teu mark to be passed in November this year.
The data also shows the extent to which the growth has accelerated: while it took 21 months to get from 8m teu to 9m teu, the anticipated period between 12m and 13m teu is only eight months.
AI
