‘Shipshape 10 List’, a list of news and articles published in the current week that a senior executive in shipping, shipping finance, commodities, energy, supply chain and infrastructure should had noticed; news and articles that are shaping the agenda and the course of the maritime industry.

Sometimes seemingly tangential, sometimes humorous, occasionally sarcastic, but always insightful and topical.

And, this week’s ‘Shipshape 10’:

As 2016 heads to an inglorious end, market activity and news stories have come to a stop. Celebrating the holidays and saturnalianly welcoming the new year has taken priority in the hope that it will not be just a continuation of the present, but a much better year, with fewer dead-ends, dead markets, dead companies. The pertinent stories of the week:

1. Globalization took hits in 2016; Will 2017 lead to more? (from the AP)

2. Singapore Defaults Seen as Bellwether for 2017 Asia Distress (from Bloomberg)

3. More Asian Defaults Loom in 2017 Amid Korea Shipyard Debt (from Bloomberg)

4. China to Target Overcapacity in Shipping (from the Maritime Executive)

5. China Turns to $503 Billion Rail Expansion to Boost Growth (from Bloomberg)

6. Hedge funds boost bullish U.S. crude oil bets fourth week in a row (from Reuters)

7. U.S. refiners face severe labor shortage for deferred maintenance (from Reuters)

8. Singapore enters 2017 with mandatory use of mass flow meter bunkering (from Seatrade)

The relevance of the story for this commercially-oriented blog, in our opinion, is the use of the image of the cruiseship MV ‘Queen Mary 2’ under the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge accompanying the story; the picture is from sistership blog with maritime images, In The Sea We See!

9. Coast Guard Ends Search for Missing Cruise Ship Passenger Off New Jersey (from gCaptain)

10. Hawaii ferry dreams face cost, public opinion hurdles (from the AP)

Bonus feature fitting the holiday season and the epicurean delights of the season:

How to Order Oysters (from the Wall Street Journal)

Image credit: Karatzas Images

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