Ocean Freight Comments
Transportation and Export Report: Jay O’Neil, O’Neil Commodity Consulting: It was not an exciting week in dry-bulk markets, but in today’s world that is a welcome thing. Markets started out soft and gained a little momentum as the week progressed to end up slightly higher at week’s end. The Capesize sector was relatively flat but the Panamax and Supramax markets found some support and moved slightly higher. Over the last seven weeks dry-bulk rates have been range bound with U.S. Gulf to Asia trading in a narrow range of just $2.00/MT.
There are lots of concerns remain regarding the backlog of container and dry-bulk vessels waiting at Chinese ports due to nation’s COVID lockdowns. Slow turn times create the need for more ships and cause big supply chain problems.
