Despite the demise of the dry bulk market of late, shipowners appear more optimistic in the long run, something shown by their return to shipyards over the past few days. In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Allied said that “another interesting week took place in the newbuilding market, given the fair number of fresh projects being pushed forward as of late. Despite the sluggish start at the onset of the new year, the dry bulk sector returned on a relatively “strong” course, given the numerous new orders that emerged, focused, ...

Despite primarily covering air and ocean freight rates, the Xeneta platform also offers insights into the costs of transporting the container to some major inland rail hubs. This provides shippers with information on the cost of the seaborne leg of the journey and the costs associated with getting their boxes to major railway hubs. Examples include Xeneta’s aggregation for US Midwest rail ramps, including Chicago and St. Louis hubs. In our weekly rate update for Week 4 in 2022, we talk about increasing premiums for US East Coast and Midwest ...

To that end, DNV will team up with Singapore’s leading infrastructure developer Surbana Jurong and the Singapore Maritime Academy (SMA). DNV’s work scope will comprise ammonia demand forecasting, bunkering site recommendations, the development of conceptual designs of bunkering modes like truck to ship or ship to ship, HAZID/HAZOP/QRA studies, as well as drafting of technical and operational guidelines. While ammonia is said to be one of the most promising fuels to decarbonize shipping, DNV research shows that a number of safety gaps hold the potential to disrupt the speed and ...

Vintage tonnage is expected to be rather scarce during the coming weeks, as China’s Holidays and subsequent Olympics is expected to dampen ship owners’ appetite for more sales. In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Clarkson Platou Hellas said that “there are small pockets of tonnage being circulated into the recycling market, mainly from the tanker sector, but whether these units are eventually sold for recycling remains to be seen as still some fragments of interest from further trading buyers are evident. All recycling destinations in the Indian sub-Continent have aggressive ...

Over two-thirds of respondents to a global survey conducted by Container xChange, the world’s leading technology logistics company, expect Chinese New Year factory closures to further disrupt container shipping supply chains. Most respondents also expect that the February Lunar New Year holidays in China will result in delayed transit times and reduced availability of containers. “We always expect a spike in container shipping demand ahead of Lunar New Year holidays in China as shippers look to ship cargo ahead of factory closures as workers in coastal areas return to families ...

2021 saw significant trends and changes in the Shipping industry with record breaking Container demand, surging steel prices, and the threat of returning lockdowns as new Covid-19 variants emerged. These factors have combined to result in a diverse demolition market. Last year saw 704 vessels sold for scrap overall, with a combined DWT of 26.4 mil and a total scrap value of USD 2.7 bil. Scrapyards have stayed busy with the total number of vessels sent for demolition climbing by 20% since 2020, and 26% since 2019, when 583 and ...

A limited supply of fresh tonnage could speed up the recovery of the tanker segment, which unlike other parts of shipping, has failed to stage any sort of recovery over the past 18 months. In a recent report, shipbroker Allied said that “the tanker sector has remained in the background during 2021 after its catastrophic performance during 2020, when the BDTI reached its lowest point ever at 403bp. Market sentiment has been devastated, new orders have been limited, pushing the tanker orderbook (>25,000dwt) to its lowest figure since 2001, while ...

Container demand growth is losing some momentum amid mounting headwinds, but carriers will continue to rake huge profits, according to Drewry’s latest Container Forecaster report. Fast rising inflation, ongoing supply chain bottlenecks and the Omicron Covid-19 variant are conspiring to slow the pace of growth in container handling, forcing Drewry to lower its outlook for world port throughput in 2022 to 4.6% in the latest Container Forecaster, from 5.2% in the previous edition. The full-year 2021 estimate was also downgraded to 6.5%, from 8.2%. However, Drewry forecasts that ocean carriers ...

A copper deficit is set to hit trade and the energy transition hard by the end of the decade, according to Rystad Energy. Global demand for the pink metal will outstrip supply by more than six million tonnes by 2030, unless investment in mining is substantially increased. The shortfall threatens to dent the move to renewables and particularly the growth of electric vehicles manufacturing as there is currently no substitute for copper in electrical applications, Rystad said. The analyst projects a 16% rise in copper demand to reach 25.5 million ...

With the shipping industry gradually expected to move towards cleaner fuels, ordering a newbuilding vessel today can be a very difficult “exercise” from a compliance and financial point of view. So what are the options that ship owners have opted to choose? In its latest weekly report, shipbroker Gibson said that “decarbonisation talk appears to be everywhere nowadays – on a government level and in a plethora of industries. Last year saw several international agreements reached during COP26 as well as European Union proposals to include shipping in their emissions ...

There was little support to be found for the Capesize market over the last week as dwindling rates and rising bunker prices slashed earnings for owners with the 5TC Weighted Average dropping to $7,390. The Pacific had little further left to drop as the transpacific C10 was priced at sub operating expense levels of $4,200. The Atlantic basin has fared slightly better, yet very few fixtures were heard. The Transatlantic C8 lowered – $8,100 over the week to settle at $11,200. Fronthaul business was more difficult to place over the ...

The highly synchronized global supply chain system developed over the past 30 years is under strain like never before and resolving the disruption will be less a “sprint” and more of a “marathon” that runs well into 2022, according to a new report by IHS Markit, (NYSE: INFO), a world leader in critical information, analytics and solutions. The report, entitled The Great Supply Chain Disruption: Why it Continues in 2022 provides a comprehensive review and forward-looking perspectives from leading IHS Markit experts across a broad spectrum of the global economy. ...

The long-expected year-end recovery in dirty tanker spot freight rates failed to materialize in December, as lockdowns at the end of the year and softer Chinese buying limited tonnage demand, OPEC said this week, in its latest monthly report. On average, VLCCs and Aframax slipped 5% and 3%, respectively, m-o-m in December. Suezmax managed a 7% gain over the month before, but remained well below pre-COVID-19 levels. For the year 2021, average VLCC and Suezmax spot freight rates witnessed their worst performance going back more than a decade, while Aframax ...

On 14 January 2022 the European Parliament’s Rapporteur, MEP Peter Liese, published his draft report on a proposal to revise the Emissions Trading System (ETS) Directive¹ which forms part of the ‘Fit for 55’ package of climate and energy reforms published on 14 July 2021. The draft report includes a number of ambitious amendments to emissions trading for the maritime sector – the Maritime ETS – which, if agreed, will put more pressure on the maritime industry to switch to cleaner fuels sooner than originally planned. Further amendments are expected ...

As we head towards IMO2050, there is no doubt that the future of shipping will comprise a mix of fuel solutions and the shipping industry will need all of them to meet future fuel demands. We believe LNG has an important role, along with bioenergies and hydrogen-based fuels, in shipping’s energy transition. The adoption of marine LNG is expected to continue to experience an accelerated growth into 2030. In tandem with this growth, we believe within this decade (2021-2030), the shipping industry will see the practical development and deployment of ...