Ocean Freight Comments
Transportation and Export Report: Jay O’Neil, O’Neil Commodity Consulting: I cannot say that world ocean freight markets really did much this week. It was mostly a continuing situation of sailing in circles. The Capesize iron ore market did rally about $1.00/MT on the western Australia-to-China route, but other markets just tried to limit the negative news. Most news stories continue to discuss the oversized fleet and how much time it will take to soak up the excess of ships. The uncertainty over the world economic picture just makes the calculations all the more difficult.
Below is a recent history of freight values for Capesize vessels of iron ore from Western Australia to China:
The charts below represent January-December 2014 annual totals versus year-to-date 2015 container shipments to the Thailand.
