In view of the continuing (sharp) decline of volumes in seaborne car trade because of the Corona crisis, the outlook for the car transport sector is full of concerns in mid-2020 and analysts do not expect a rapid demand recovery. The latest estimates from Clarkson Research in August 2020 suggest that car trade could decline by 34% in 2020. All related economic indicators are behaving accordingly: Charter rates have plummeted to a historic low. In addition, the number of inactive ships reached a record level of around 30% of the fleet in the middle of this year according to Lloyd's List and Shippax. Above that, market concentration continues towards a few global players such as WWL, MOL, NYK and K-Line with a market share of nearly 60%.
The volumes in the leading ports in the car transhipment sector also show a slump of almost 40% on average year-on-year, if the half-year results for 2019 and 2020 are used as a comparison. The ports of Durban/South Africa and Veracruz/Mexico, for example, are the ones that suffered the biggest declines, with losses of around 70% each to just 14,200 and 30,200 units per month respectively. The ISL SSMR 2020-7 highlights various developments surrounding the General Cargo fleet with focus on the Ro/Ro fleet -market, the trade- and the port development. It is available as download via our Webshop.
The next issue of the SSMR, witch will be published mid of September, will deal with passenger shipping, with a special focus on the severely crisis-ridden cruise market.
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2020/8/20 16:22:41