Shipping in Crisis!
Economy | Information | History | Online | Facts | World | Global | Money
Do you remember listening to the shipping forecast on the radio? It was like a foreign language. Today, the language of the global shipping industry is crystal clear – things are grim with a capital G… As you commute to work in the train or the car you probably don’t give much thought to shipping containers. Those big rectangular boxes that you see stacked up in ports and on the deck of massive cargo ships have an important story to tell. They’re the modern day Silk Road. The main means by which global trade and commerce gets delivered. And the story they are telling us today is not pretty. Almost everyone that you’ll hear spouting off about the state of the world’s economy has some sort of agenda. Usually that involves talking up a situation to make you believe that everything’s hunky dory and under control. But there are some raw statistics that we can use to cut through all the hot air and get to some facts that tell us the real story. One such is shipping rates. What people are paying to hire container ships to deliver their goods around the world. Before the financial crisis oil tankers were fetching a hundred thousand dollars a day. Now, they regard ten thousand collars as a good pay day. There are specialist brokers in places like Singapore that negotiate these rates between producers and fleet owners. And their bonuses have not been spectacular for much of the last decade. As with all commodities, the good times in the early part of this millennium led fleet owners to lay down more and more new container ships. Everyone thinks the growth will keep coming forever and invests accordingly. So, just as the financial crisis started to impact world trade eight years ago, scores of new ships came online. The inevitable result? A crash in hire rates and lots of ships moored idle in places like Singapore and Gibraltar. China’s move to a services led economy has exacerbated the problem, while the anaemic growth in Europe is nowhere near enough to take up the slack. The impact on margins can be seen from sector leader Maersk. Its recent numbers showed a fifteen per cent drop in revenue but a massive sixty one per cent decline in profits. The inevitable result? Four thousand job losses from its twenty three thousand strong onshore workforce. Things are no better in the non-container based shipping world. The Baltic Dry index, a benchmark that tracks the cost of shipping bulk raw materials such as coal, steel and iron ore, has tumbled to a near thirty year low. Volatility in the currency markets also impacts shipping, with the Euro falling against the Chinese Yuan during twenty fifteen making imports more expensive. That may reverse this year as the Chinese authorities finally start to allow some devaluation of their currency, but some serious damage has been done since the financial crisis. Another culprit is the oil price crash, heavily impacting countries like Russia that depends on oil exports for much of its income. The German port of Hamburg, famous for its Reeperbahn where the Beatles once had a residency, saw its trade with Russia crash thirty six per cent last year as Russians cut back on imports of German cars and heavy machinery. It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that global trade really is slowing down when you look at any metrics connected with the shipping industry. It’s global. It has no central banks or politicians controlling its data. And it’s in crisis. If you believe what the politicians are saying about everything being under control and nicely on course, be very careful out there!
Comments
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PLUS there's more shipps builded than scraped. and you can't pay 100 millions dollars for a new ship that you can't paid in a years to come.
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Is very easy, economically a country can give more jobs to their people by mading all by themselves and not get importer from another part of the wolrd. China whiles it becomes more and more industrialized is ""Less hard"" for them supply what their people consumes. And what shipping companies just did? made more, more and even more ships, than the exports and imports in containers
Another thing is this...A shipping companies gets a huge charge in their neck when has to deal with investors, with debts, bonds to pay, companies actions not divide themselves. And if you are good at math and common sense, you would not a simple actions about thing
A shipping company CAN'T CHARGE MORE FOR CONTAINER THAN THE PRICE OF MAINTENANCE OF THE SHIP ITSELFT, and isn't really a hard know how, you just have to calculate the fuel, the employees, and the taxes, along with maintenance, etc, etc, etc... to know what's should be your running cost by container SUPPOSING IT GOES FULLY LOAD, but because never goes it lets say you should charge at least the double of the ship's running cost if it goes loaded at a 50%
And that's where's the value of engineering, you should have to know how much cost a container knowing everyship, all of the specific running cost of each one. Because the 19.000 TEU ships have the same engine and fuel consumption as the 14.000 TEU ones -
I am very happy to listen to opinions but You always talk about Bad side of things Do you ever see anything good in life ????? My own feelings are the world is in on hell of a place at present But I am optimistic I look for the good in life When the crowd is running one way with fear I see Opportunity I have a great life every day I welcome You must have one hell of a life you must fear it a lot LIfe is far too short t keep worrying it gets you no where I know its your opinion but why not look on the Brightside of investment and money there is always light after dark and yes I think you should be careful out there
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