Capesize (Atlantic and Pacific)
The Atlantic Capesize market was extremely weak most of the week and the Pacific market was almost following the Atlantic. Baltic Capesize Index lost 608 ponts, the 4 T/c routes $ 8,149 daily, Brazil/China iron ore lost almost 2 dollars and the West Australia/China run about 1 dollar. It seems market is not supported anymore, the mid week holiday in China will not make the things easy and most of iron ore operators are expecting another fall again. In the East tonnage appeared again to be over supplied, and even if the iron ore mines in Australia were quite active, they had no problem to find tonnage and rates dropped close to $ 11 level.
Panamax (Atlantic and Pacific)
A really bad week with rates tumbling in both basins. Even if some early vessels in the Atlantic found cover it appears the market will be steady for the following week. Committed vessels in South America were also under pressure. Rates in the Pacific were keeping slow down with rates at around $27,000 daily for NoPac rounds but as tonnage increased rates succumbed. Demand for tonnage from the East for South America/China cargoes almost dried up as news came out with the Chinese cancelling some Brazil soyabean purchases and delaying others.
Handy (Far East/Pacific)
Most of the Supramax spot chartering activities concentrated on the coal trade into India, with a larger number of liftings from Indonesia and a few out of Australia as well. Activity was not large enough to compensate the huge number of available tonnage. Owners' efforts to keep rate levels firm enough was vanished through the week as charterers were reluctant to finalize any deal unless against lower rates. North Pacific round voyage rates showed to be the most affected ones, with charterers under-rating the market and owners ending up fixing in the high teens. Short period fixing was still active with larger units booking 3/5 months in the low 20,000's and modern fancy Handies agreeing very high teens for slightly longer duration.
Handy (North Europe/Mediterranean)
Trading was very quiet all around Europe with low chartering interest for fertilizer and scrap out of Northern Europe/Lower Baltic which failed to result in any concrete action. The weaker time-charter interest from the Black Sea to the East built up a larger number of "MEG suitable" available tonnage. Charterers involved with the Middle East bound grain stems have been benefited a lot, getting larger market response at cheaper freight levels. Delays in delivering the new crop at the Black Sea loading ports was postponing charterers' fixing and further weakening the rates. A benefit which indirectly reflected to the advantage of other charterers moving steels from the area into the USG who managed to fix large tonnage at lower rates.
Handy (USA/N.Atlantic/Lakes/S.America)
The week started showing a growth of available tonnage which allowed charterers to avoid rushing into fixtures or agreeing lower rates. Positional situations still allowed owners' to gain some premiums from the USG. A good portion of the prompt tonnage was washed away trough the week at decreasing rate levels. Getting close to the weekend rates were still under pressure for Supramaxes and even more for the smaller sizes. Still, the larger units were fetching high 40,000s levels for trips into the Far East, which on its own was not a bad figure at all. Also, the "rush to fix" has considerably cut down the number of larger vessels which are still able to safely load in June, it may arise some more positive positional deals for owners who have unfixed tonnage.
Handy (Indian Ocean/South Africa)
Indian Ocean showed to remain a quite discouraging business scenario for owners who kept struggling to move their tonnage away from the India Ocean. Supramax iron ore trade to China was still going at much reduced volume at low rates which were more and more attracting owners of the larger units to avoid this direction, also in connection with the ending up in a depressed Pacific market. Some owners, who have tonnage ballasts direction South Africa, went for coal rounds back to India for which time-charter rates were better compared to China bound iron ore. Other chose to continue their ballast in South America.
Banchero Costa and Co Spa
Mail: research@bancosta.it
Web: http://www.bancosta.it/