* Hong Kong / China - Carriers depend on cheap fuel as volumes, revenue per box declines
-- The first quarter results for container shipping lines are coming in with profits, or at least a narrowing of losses, common among carriers that have so far reported their financials... Unsurprisingly, the results were led by Maersk Line, which measures its quarterly profits in the hundreds of millions, but behind the positive result is a trend that is being experienced across the industry — a drop in container volumes accompanied by falling revenue per container... At the moment the carriers are able to mitigate declining revenue with lower operating costs enabled mainly by cheap bunker fuel. Bunker prices fell by around 40 percent in the first quarter compared to the same period last year, and with more than a third of the operating costs consumed by fuel, the benefits for container lines have been significant... This has softened the blow of falling container volumes and freight rates as demand from the Eurozone and emerging economies remains weak, and the U.S.A. recovery wobbles along... The focus on reducing costs is being aggressively applied across the industry, from deploying mega-vessels by the carriers that can afford it, to cutting unprofitable routes and improving networks, to trimming workforces and forming vessel sharing alliances...With weak freight rates already eroding revenue per container, any sustained increase in the price of oil will quickly start to have an impact...
(Photo: OOCL saw volumes and revenue per TEU fall in the first quarter) -- Hong Kong, China - J.O.C., by Greg Knowler - May 16, 2015Labels: transport and logistics reports
![[Valid Atom 1.0]](valid-atom.png "Validate my Atom 1.0 feed")
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home