Ships

The newbuilding market remains red hot with PIL the latest carrier to jump in with a new order for 5 LNG dual fuel units of 13,000 teu at Hudong Zhonghua announced on 19 August 2024. The ships are aimed at the Latin America trade with deliveries starting from late 2026. Wan Hai also confirmed LOIs for 16 new methanol dual fuel units of 8,000-8,700 teu at CSBC and Hyundai Samho. These orders bring the total containership newbuilding capacity contracted since the start of 2024 to 2m teu, with the

CMA CGM has retained the Suez routing for its Asia-Med Phoenician Express (BEX2) service despite escalating tensions in the Middle East over the past week after Israeli forces attacked the port of Hodeidah in Yemen on 20 July in retaliation for the Houthi drone attack that hit Tel Aviv on 19 July 2024. The Phoenician Express (BEX2) calls at Shanghai, Ningbo, Busan, Shekou, Singapore, (Suez Canal), Alexandria, Beirut, Tripoli, Koper, Trieste, Rijeka, Alexandria, Jeddah, Port Klang, Shekou, Shang

MSC has acquired 2 newbuilding contracts for a pair of 14,000 teu ships currently under construction at Jiangnan Shipyard from BAL Container Line for $133.3m in total or $66.65m for each ship. BAL's parent company, LC Logistics, will book a profit of $49m from the sale as the book value of these ships stand at $84.3m for the first 2 installments paid to Jiangnan for the construction of the ships so far. The 2 ships were ordered by BAL in June 2022 and are scheduled for delivery in July and Sept

The global containership fleet has exceeded the 30m teu milestone for the first time with 51 new containerships delivered in June, bringing the total number of ships delivered in the first 6 months of this year to 271 units for 1.68m teu. A further 1.49m teu is scheduled for delivery later in the 2nd half of the year with only minimal slippages expected. The 2nd quarter is the peak of the current delivery cycle, with an average monthly delivery rate of 315,000 teu at almost 2 new ships joining

The United States Trade Representative (USTR) initiated an investigation on China’s maritime, logistics, and shipbuilding sectors on 17 April 2024 based on the petition filed by 5 US labor unions that alleged unfair policies and practices to undermine fair competition and dominate the market. Amongst the proposed remedies to address China’s dominance is a fee on vessels built in China that dock at US ports. Although containerships built at Chinese shipyards account for only 27% of the current f

The average age of the containership fleet currently stands at 13.8 years, although it drops to 11.1 years if calculated on a teu-weighted basis due to younger age of the larger ships. Amongst the Top 15 carriers, MSC has the oldest fleet with an average age of 16.8 years while Maersk has the oldest fleet on teu-weighted terms at 12.8 years. Despite the aging fleet, carriers have been slow in scrapping their older tonnage, with just 163,000 teu scrapped year to date compared to new deliveries

Carriers have made no headway in controlling surplus capacity, in sharp contrast to the same period last year when the idled fleet rose sharply through November. This time, idled capacity peaked at only 400,000 teu in October but has dropped to just 187,000 teu currently with most of the capacity withdrawn returning after brief intermissions. Even the rise in ships in drydock in October has started to reverse, with the total capacity in drydock falling to 800,000 teu after its recent peak. Chi

The global containership fleet has passed 28m teu last week, with total new ship deliveries since the start of this year reaching 1.94m teu. More than 1 new ship has been delivered each day since June this year, with the same pace to continue through the next 12 months. Carriers are facing a difficult time maintaining recent freight rate gains in the face of the capacity influx, with vessel scrapping and idling remaining at very low levels. The freight rates (SCFIS) were down between 80% and 9

Charter rates are seeing sharper drops with the start of the winter slack season further pushing down market sentiment while charter periods are also significantly shortened with more flexible delivery periods of 1-6 months being reported. Idle tonnage is starting to build up again but the pace of idling is still slower than last year, with most of the larger ships due to return to service by November. However, the build up of surplus tonnage is starting to bite with even MSC forced to idle

The idle fleet increased slightly to 53 ships for 166,936 teu as at 1 October 2023, and will increase further over the coming week as the blank sailing programs to be implemented in October will leave some ships without employment albeit only temporarily. The 23,656 teu MSC MINA has been idle since 24 September and is currently without assignment through October, with MSC also sending more ships for scrubber retrofits over the past week. However, the idled fleet is not expected to match the sha