‘Shipshape 10’ News for Week Ending April 22nd, 2017

Posted on April 22, 2017 by Karatzas Marine Advisors & Co.

‘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, periodically humorous, occasionally sarcastic, sporadically artistic, inferentially erotic, but always insightful and topical.

And, this week’s ‘Shipshape 10’:

The dry bulk and commodities market had a difficult week overall; high inventories and weakening demand are the short-term drivers to blame :

1a.Baltic Dry Index Falls Almost 4%, Biggest Loss Since Mid-December (Reuters via gCaptain)

1b. Dry Bulk Freight Market: The Best Is Yet To Come (Seatrade Maritime)

1c. Iron Ore Price Tumbles To A Near Six-Month Low (Financial Times)

In the tanker market, a legal twist to the market consolidating forces; the article in Lloyd’s List quoting Basil Karatzas:

2a. Tanker Wars — The Empire Strikes Back (Lloyds’s List)

2b. Frontline Sues DHT (Splash 24/7)

3c. U.S. Court Rejects Frontline’s Last-Minute Bid To Stop BW-DHT Deal (gCaptain)

An iconic name in the German shipping world is in restructuring while one of their sponsored companies has been on the block; lots of head-scratching for the logic supporting the acquisition and the price paid for it; but shipping is a gutsy industry:

4a. Rickmers Group Reaches Restructuring Agreement (Maritime Executive)

4b. Navios Partners Buys Bankrupt Rickmers Maritime Boxship Fleet For $113m (Seatrade Maritime)

And, speaking of consolidation, a Korean shipbuilder got a new lease on life:

5a. Korea Avoids Daewoo Shipwreck (Bloomberg)

5b. Keeping DSME Afloat Bondholders Enforced To Agree On Reviving Daewoo Shipbuilding (Business Korea)

An interesting in-depth article in the Wall Street Journal on the Port of Lazaro Cardenas on the west coast of Mexico; APM’s ambitious terminal to build a strong base just outside the US to by-pass any Jones Act requirements have been cut short by a possible border import tax:

6. Trump’s Trade Plans Spell Uncertainty For Mexican Port (The Wall Street Journal)

Keeping an eye on a crucial commodity for shipping, grains, still at the intersection of government policy:

7a. U.S. Farmers, Who Once Fed The World, Are Overtaken By New Powers (The Wall Street Journal)

7b. Russian Agriculture Sector Flourishes Amid Sanctions (Financial Times)

7c. American Farm Belt Anxious About Trump Trade Threats (Financial Times)

Keeping an eye on another crucial-to-shipping commodity, oil, where it seems there are diverse opinions on the state of the market; good luck to the tanker owners deciphering the market, while the Eni-Libya article should emanate good news for the aframax tanker market:

8a. Oil’s Slide Towards $50 A Barrel Slows (Financial Times)

8b. Oil Dives Below $50 As Confidence In Opec Wavers (Financial Times)

8c. OPEC Sees A World That Still Has Too Much Oil (Bloomberg)

8d. Eni-Operated Libya Oil Field To Re-Open After Two-Year Halt (Bloomberg)

8e. Saudi Aramco Chief Warns Of Looming Oil Shortage (Financial Times)

And, shipping, besides financial, market and regulatory risks, definitely have to deal with operational risk too; two million barrels of crude oil in a supertanker grounded can easily turn into a nightmare:

9. Salvors Working To Refloat Grounded VLCC In Java Sea (gCaptain)

Taking a looking on the US domestic commodities, energy and shipping markets, some strong headlines point to very diverse directions:

10a. Blackstone To Buy Permian Basin Pipelines For $2 Billion (Bloomberg)

10b. Coal Shipments Lift CSX Earnings In First Report With New CEO (The Wall Street Journal)

10c. Princess Cruises Sentenced To Pay $40 Million Fine For Pollution Scheme (Miami Herald)

And, for those with a literary bone to nourish:
Literature’s Arctic Obsession The Greatest Writers Of The Nineteenth Century Were Drawn To The North Pole. What Did They Hope To Find There? (The New Yorker)

And, for those with travel flexibility, please join us next week at George Town, Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands, for the 2nd Cayman Maritime Week; Basil Karatzas will present at the 5th Mare Forum Cayman Shipping and Yachting Summit on the implications of the Trump Administration to the shipping industry.

A pretty face of the cruising industry. Image credit: Karatzas Images

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‘Shipshape 10’ News for Week Ending April 15th, 2017

Posted on April 15, 2017 by Karatzas Marine Advisors & Co.

Sometimes seemingly tangential, periodically humorous, occasionally sarcastic, sporadically artistic, inferentially erotic, but always insightful and topical.

And, this week’s ‘Shipshape 10’:

On trade:
1. Whatever Happened to Free Trade? (The Wall Street Journal)

While more and bigger containerships still getting delivered:
2a. Biggest Ship to Ever Call On U.S. East Coast Arriving in May (gCaptain)

2b. Madrid Maersk Snatches Record from MOL Triumph (The Maritime Executive)

Chinese financing always on focus:
3a. A Sunny Spell – A new Mood of Optimism Infects Investors in China’s Banks (The Economist)

3b. Chinese Finance is Storing up Trouble for the rest of the World (Financial Times)

Ongoing concerns on the apparent sinking of MV ’Stellar Daisy’; Lloyd’s List article quoting Basil Karatzas:
4a. Stellar Daisy Casualty Sparks Karatzas Warning on Conversions (Lloyd’s List)

4b. Intercargo Calls for Quick and Thorough Investigation into MV ‘Stellar Daisy’ Sinking (Seatrade)

4c. “Rolling like I’m inside Washing Machine”: Terrifying Account Sinking MV ‘Stellar Daisy’

Korean shipbuilder DSME seemingly in an existential unbearable lightness of being, being getting into receivership and obtaining more newbuilding orders; Wall Street Journal article quoting Basil Karatzas:
5a. Korean Shipbuilder’s Survival Hinges on Creditors’ Losses (The Wall Street Journal)

5b. HMM in for up to 10 VLCCs at DSME (Splash 24/7)

Insightful articles on the German shipping market from Lloyd’s List:
6a. Rickmers Maritime Trust falls but Nemesis dances on (Lloyd’s List)

6b. German Owners on the Brink (Lloyd’s List)

While another German company with pedigree has fallen off the pier:
7a. Rickmers Maritime to be Wound-up After Last Ditch Restructuring Talks Fail (Seatrade)

7b. Charter Market Recovery Too Late to Save Rickmers Maritime (The Loadstar via gCaptain)

On commodities and iron ore:
8a. Iron ore Sinks as China Glut Unnerves Traders (The Financial Times)

8b. China’s Steel Pillars Corrode (Bloomberg)

LNG definitely is promisingly in the news with every day:
9a. LNG-Fueled Mega Container Ship Design Approved (The Maritime Executive)

9b. Gas Fleet Concept Receives Approval in Principle (The Maritime Executive)

9c. Jaxport’s LNG Bunkering Facility is Ready to Work (The Maritime Executive)

9d. New U.S. Pipelines to Drive Natural Gas Boom as LNG Exports Surge (Reuters)

With global warming and the navigating in the Arctic being critical:
10. Icebreakers – The quickest way to break the ice is by submarine (The Economist)

And, a few more sad thoughts on yet another shipping tragedy, the Jones Act ferry MV ‘El Faro’ that was lost last year during the hurricane Joaquin:

11a. ’I’M A GONER’: El Faro’s Last Hours as Ship Sails into Storm (Associated Press)

11b. El Faro’s Tragic Ending ‘Burned’ in Investigator’s Mind (Associated Press)

LNG was on the central topic at the 2017 Columbia Global Energy Summit. From left, Dr Tim Boersma (CGEP), Charif Souki (Tellurian), Dr Tatiana Mitrova (CGEP), Jeroen van der Veer (ex-CEO Shell), Fu Chengyu (former Chairman of CNOOC / Sinopec). Image credit: Karatzas Images.

‘Shipshape 10’ News for Week Ending March 5th, 2017

Posted on March 4, 2017 by Karatzas Marine Advisors & Co.

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

And, this week’s ‘Shipshape 10’:

1a. Ruling the waves – Industry expert Basil Karatzas on China’s quest to dominate global shipping (Week in China)

1b. Dry bulk market report: The China factor (Seatrade Maritime)

2a. Hapag-Lloyd 4Q Operating Profit Rises On Cost Cuts; Full-Year Results Weak (The Wall Street Journal)

2b. FMC Commissioner Doyle wants container alliance safeguards for carrier bankruptcy (Seatrade Maritime)

3a. Shipping’s blues – The many barriers to scrapping cargo ships (The Economist) (quoting Basil Karatzas)

3b. Shipping slump: Why a vessel worth $60m was sold as scrap (BBC News)

3c. Tsuneishi to Build Giant $100 million Recycling Yard in the Philippines (Splash 24/7)

4. Hyundai Heavy Shareholders Approve Restructuring Plan (The Maritime Executive)

5a. Ezra flags ‘immediate going concern issue’ on $900m exposure as guarantor to EMAS Chiyoda Subsea (Seatrade Maritime)
5b. Let This Be a Lesson, Singapore (Bloomberg)
6. International Shipholding Restructuring Plan Confirmed (The Wall Street Journal)

7. Could The Struggling Shipping Industry Create a Banking Crash in Germany? (Equities.com)

8. Back from the dead? Chinese iron ore miners plot return as prices surge (Reuters)

9. Watch U.S. Oil Drilling Collapse—and Rise Again (Bloomberg)

10. Exxon Will Remake Shale Or Shale Will Remake Exxon (Bloomberg)

Another definition of shipping: Grown up men playing with the water… Drinking Cup (Helmeted Men Riding Dolphins), Archaic Period ca 520 BC. Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Image credit: Karatzas Images.