According to industry sources, the recent rise in the freight rates was too less to improve the margins of shipping companies and the rates may not improve significantly in the rest of 2013.
The Baltic Dry Index, which measures cost of shipping bulk commodities, has risen from an average of 745 in February to 876 in March. In fact, in the beginning of April, it crossed the 900 mark.
Similarly, the Baltic Panamax Index rose from an average of 807 in February to 1,147 in March, even crossing 200 on some days. However, the rates for the larger capsize vessels did not see much increase and were more or less steady.
Some industry players attributed the rise in the rates to some increased charters from China and other temporary factors.
Shipping firms, however, do not see the rise in rates to sustain going forward. One should not read much into this (slight increase in rates). Capesize vessels are still not getting more than $5,000-6,000 and the Panamax rates hovering between $6,000 and $8,000 a day, said AR Ramakrishnan, MD of Essar shipping.
Rates in the Atlantic for Panamax class remained reasonably well supported. The firm rates have drawn away some tonnage from Pacific, limiting number of ships for shorter round voyages via Indonesia to India and Japan.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.