make sure you can rely on your assumptions… or fall and get wet

1,502 is today’s BDI level. Last time BDI crossed this mark from below to above such level, we need to fly back March 2014. On the BDI, putting aside the spike seen in Dec 2016, remember the ECSA market getting Crazy, likewise, March 2014 is the right timing.

At that time, 30kmt Rouen to Algeria bulk wheat stem was booked in the $23/25 region and 34kdwt lady was able to get $12,500 daily aps from Recalada to Continent.

Today, seems market is respectively around $20usdpmt for the Rouen cargo while the latters is  reported done @ US $ 14,000

Main differences from 2014 to now is on the bunkers value, back in March 2014, the barrel was above US $107 and exchange rate Euro/usd was hovering around 1,40 while today it’s around 1.19.

For once shipowners will not rush to fix before the week-end and discussing w/ various ones today, their mood is rather to be in a waiting position rather than jump on proposals, they’re confident to get charterers fighting one against each other to have the “privilege” to get the ship.

Still difficult to get an expert analysis on why market is going this way. Some are trying to tell the newbuilding activity has not been as good as it is currently for years, but again Newbuilding orders movements is only a consequence on the market of the faith investors has in the market recovery and not the other way round.

You should have a go on these figures and analysis dropped by Baltic Exchange,  “2016 was the worst year in newbuilding activity in the last 25 yrs, with highest number of new orders in one month which was 9, in july 2017, 48 orders was placed and respectively 34 in august 2017”. When as a consequence, prices are hitting their highest in the last 21 months. On the paper, it’s looking like same, all routes at least on the Capes are showing an increase until end 2018.

Key question remains to know if the newbuilding activity is thanks to cheap money with easy access to finance or preferably thanks to strong and reliable cable (unlike this journalist) and strong cargoes movements.

We anyway have bit of time ahead of us before these newbuildings will hit the market and maybe we shall be thankful to all these current and future shipowners for their vista.

On the spot, I still think there is not too much time ahead of charterers to fix the remaining prompt ships around.

Regards

Jerome
 

 

 

 

 

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Don’t get caught by market resilience or you’ll get stucked

Looking like all the shipowners’ stars are aligned and whichever your position, whichever your size, as soon as Owners offering a modern ship to fix they are back with the luxury to pick and choose what’s fitting best to their interest.

On the handies, yesterday +333 (half diabolic figure then) on the HS3, making on the paper the 28kdwt being worth now 11,679 $ daily. Knowing this 28kdwt index type has become “an odd size” (to steal bmti’s words), on the real life, 33/34kdwt which are more popular are able to get +$13,000 today, around $15,000 according to BMTI’s writers. (Another + $2.50pmt on a handy grains Upr to Morocco)

The USG market is proving to be resilient after (during) the local dramatic meteorlogical events. When owners asked for a premium to consider heading toward this area, it’s also now showing to be a good place to be for owners, as long as, it remains safe.

Continental and Baltic market is also offering strong numbers, +$10,000 for handy owners to end up to ECSA, supposed to be a repositioning trade!

To add some pain to charterers’ wallet, oil is moving on the upward, yesterday $55.43 for the barrel of Brent crude future, is a figure which has not been seen for a while. Keeping going this way, 15.5% rise can be expected for this quarter, last time it moved up as quickly, we need to go back to 2004. On a handy, Ecsa to Wmed, the bunker price difference from end august compared to now is worth $0.87 / mt on the freight.

While we can easily understand some local movements and the Oil upward, it’s a kind of a task to be able to explain with all rationnals behind why market is back to this revival why now and why so quickly? Yes, usually Q4 is a good season in the drybulk Industry, with needs for coal to prepare chilly winter, yes the Grains are harvested and ready to be moved, yes the USG hurricanes are breaking the balanced positions. But is it enough to explain? I’d rather quickly find a good expert to have his deep analysis, when found here, I’ll share with you.

Looking bit backward (Source Alphabulk), collectively, US listed dry bulk shipping companies have lost in Q2 2017 close to $132 Million, to be added or deducted (depending if you are a share older or a banker involved) to $187.5million loss in Q1 2017. For 2017, as a whole, $600million lost in the sea could be the projection. could be less if market keeps his current mood, could be more if, in an usual excess of confidence, they go shopping for brand new ships.

Whatever will be US big boys’ move, emergency is, I think, for charterers to

“keep calm and fix” and guess what, at Pelagos we are happy to fix quietly. Looking like there is a match

regards

Jerome

is perception always subjective?

 

Good day, good morning,

So, the shipping market is heading towards the right direction finally for Owners? Surely, we are seeing more circulars from Owners proposing their ladies “available for period,6 months, try longer“, a true signal from Owners trying to secure now the money available on the market. Another way to understand is owners having learnt from the past would rather go for 1 bird in the hand being worth than 2 in the bush.

Ex Black sea, if you have a chance to read Bmti today’s report, they assume there is a switch on size strenght. Used to be the Supras and ultras interest which may be moving down to the handies.

BMTI again mentionning a cooling down on demand on supras and ultras due to (most probably) tonnage pilling up in this area. they came with a type mistake and fail to give us how many Smx/ultras are around in EMED- BLSEA area, I have counted here, just for you.

• from 52 to 64,000dwt with max 200m loa, registered in our database, said open EMED or BLSEA in the next 7 days, registered since friday, we are counting 35 ships splitted asf:
• .8 units open BLSEA/Canakkale range
• .22 units from 52 to 58kdwt
• .24 units which shall be technically able to be in Black Sea by 26th sept, hence able to tender NOR in Blsea ports, agw of course.

That’s quite a bit of ships, but then again according to BMTI “Grains charterers have raised their rates from US$ 12/mt to US$ 13/mt for 30,000mt of wheat from Bulgaria to South Spain, which is nonetheless around US$ 2/mt short of the market“. (seeing this cargo here looking like the above mention (despite qtty) Varna \ cadiz  25000 10 pct moloo blk wheat sf abt 46       Spot – ppt     6000x\ 5000 x     3,75adc) seeing also in today’s report 37kdwt dely canakkale via blsea redel span med with grains done @ US$ 9,250 bss 33,000mt loaded, converted into Voyage terms (as above) US $ 15.00 is the magic number for a 30k stem.

To end up this today’s report, we got a serious question passed on here last friday from owners asking us seriously:

“we keep hearing: market is going up – owners are reluctant – positive signs …why are these things NEVER happen where our ships are open ?? “

I would be tempted to reply we have been through exactly the same questions not that long ago from charterers, but the other way round

““we keep hearing: market is going down – owners are giving away their ships …why are these things NEVER happen where our cargoes are open ?? “

I personally think, whichever the market, Owners keep seeing it above his current position and vice & versa, charterers keep seeing it below his current level. It’s all about the optical illusion then bit like this cat, is she going up or down stairs?  and the market is it moving up or down ward?

What about brokers then? I have been told most of them are saying what their principals willing to hear. But it’s only a rumor which I won’t spread around.

With compliments (from your devoted brokers)

rgds

Jerome

to conclude the week. the winner is

Anastasios K is our yesterday’s winner. As promised, he deserves his 15 minutes of fame.

I’m fairly sure he does not need this circular to enhance his market connections and network. Anastasios is chartering manager at Bluementhal looking after a fleet worldwide from small handies to supramaxes and as a representative of a good German Owners, he’s not always easy to handle while negotiating terms of the offer and the cp. What’s annoying me most when I’m fixing (or trying to fix) his ships is the fact that heis often rights on the terms and he’s not really used to give away a single penny out of the freight without getting a term as a counter part. Anastasios, is a faithfull reader of these reports and do not hesitate to share information he’s gathering here and there to feed these reports.

So the right answer about BING BONG is, it’s a port based in Northern Australia and if you’re wondering what the hell we are loading and discharging there, here you go with the link provided by Anastasios.

Not only Anastasios is sharp in shipping but also pretty good on Google.

Marketwise, still on the upward, ending the week on a positive trend and leaving owners generally speaking on a good mood for the week-end to come. Time might be their ally. Owners’ can have a busy time thinking about all which was said this week in London during the London International Shipping Week which has just finished.

Lot of work on their table, lot of decisions to be made shortly to help keeping the cargoes, the ships, the crew safe, to help the earth breezing better. And as a French, still being part of Europe I won’t comment this statement from Lynsey Duffield about “UK being the leading global center for maritime business”. It’s her job to promote UK as member Insight Director for The cityUk, anyway you’ll find here, the program and what was the schedule of this week.

for those of you being on twitter you can find lot of info by following @LISW17, you can also find some useful information on this account @jeromesorrel (this account is my favourite one).

Have a nice day, week-end and instead of googling Anastasios’ to try find out his phone number you can still call us here and we’ll be delighted to have a gentleman fight with him to fix your cargoes with his ships.

Rgds

Jerome

 

 

 

 

 

difference between key learnings and learning your lessons

Today, it’s all about learning something and try to remember the lesson.

I think I told you this already, when you ask to people in shipping about what they love in this Industry, most of them will reply « you always learn something »… (I personally think it’s not something which is exclusive to shipping, but more a state of mind, anyway this is another point). Also as Confucius could have said, « a day during which you did not learned anything is a wasted day ».

With these above statements I’m very pleased to enhance your shipping knowledge, try to save your day and so far, my key learning of the day is discovering there is a port in the world called BING BONG. And it’s not a theory but a real fact. First of you who’ll reply to this circular confirming me where is this port located, will enjoy the Andy Warhol 15minutes of fame thanks to a dedicated mention in my next report.

Appart from the above, chartering is remaining in a fairly healthy mood for owners, Looking at todays BDI’s report, only one fixture is only with 4 digit numbers (namely mv ‘Bonas’ blt 2010 52kdwt dely Zho Ushan prompt redel Wc India w/ steels @ $9,500daily»). Not that long ago, 5 digits numbers was the exception. However, according to Bmti’s today’s comments « […]for many owners of Handysize vessels rates levels are still unsufficient to cover all costs including finance costs ». As an example, agile charterers, able to swap their origin quickly -to come with something where spot ships are around- are still able to make good bargains and ruining owners community’ efforts to keep market going up.

Capers raise seems not to have reach their pike, as once again, mentionned by BMTI « demurrage rates agreed in Saldanha Bay are increasing after 10 days ».  Finally, USG remains the most difficult area to read and anticipate on spot onward basis. Supras and Ultras are getting impressively high numbers, when handies are fighting for the very few cargoes proposed.

Talking about commodities, a mention about the french crop of Cereals in BMTI, which is said to be the « third biggest harvest of all time ». Knowing same records high numbers are seen almost everywhere accross the world and according to FAO numbers,

« […]as a result, world cereal supplies in 2017/2018 should reach even higher levels than previously projected, boosting world ending stocks of cereals by the close of seasons in 2018 to an all-time high […] ».

full FAO report dtd 7th sept 2017 here

Shall we suggest cereal world producers to get in touch with the shipowners community and have a talk together about the latters’ key learnings about tonnage oversupply results in their market ? or should you think we shall keep it silent, as anyway, too much tonnage available on the water does not prevent migrants to drown and die in the middle of Med sea because of lack of space on the ships chartered and likewise too much cereals around the world does not prevent people around the world to starve to death (but these points are probably not the right place to talk about anyway right, we are here to talk about business, not politics).

Have a nice day and should you look for some agile brokers, stop looking around, we are here.

Rgds

Jerome

 

shipping drybulk recovery, milestone 1

Market according to index is slowing down today, with BDI losing few points, loss being  mainly driven by the Capers. Other sizes are managing to keep going up. Handies growth is still driven by the ECSA area, supported by fairly strong Asian routes.

Here, we are having quite few spot cargoes and spot ships but the match is difficult to make it done.  As either ballast of the ships make them too late, or ships specs make them not workable on what we have. Or vice & versa, the spot cargoes we can propose to the ships are not making sense due to too much cut size or too much ballast or not enough something (something being usually called USD).

Remember on july 27 I mentionned to you this “One market expert was claiming on july 21st « the BID needs at least an extra 1,300 points… to make sense ». I read very carefully the demonstration proposed by mr John Faraclas but unfortunately I could not find any rational behind this « 1,300pts needed »… could have been 1,299 or 1,301 (or 1,000 or 4,000) would have been the same. Maybe your falcon eyes will be better than mine. It’s anyway worth to read to have a summarized overview of the Geopolitic. Find it here “

I think I found out where the “1,300pts mark” is coming from, as according to BIMCO’s market studies drybulk “still needs to be above 1,280 on average for full year profits“. We can assume then mister John Faraclas is following closely BIMCO’s market point of view and rounded the latters figures to end up at 1,300.

You know what, according to BIMCO, still, on average the BDI for 2017 hit 1,001 today (12th sept)

slowly and (hopefully) surely, market is heading towards the safe waters. As a comparison, in 2016, the BDI average was around 700. Quite an improvement so far. Dear Owners, we are not yet out of the tough time and being on average above 1,000 does not mean it’s time to go and see your bankers for investing in brand new ships. Instead, go and see your shipyards, for the ships which are already in the books and make sure you are putting bit of money on the table to get these ships being Cyber resilients. talking about resilience, you can find here Florida shipping traffic patterns today vs yesterdays… now the hurricane is gone, ships are coming back

Finally, I was mentionning yesterday, and in few other earlier reports, the importance for grains in Black Sea which is about to take place in the next campaign. It’s looking like it’s not about to be over. Will Black Sea be the center of the Grain world in the next years is a question worth to ask. Surely, if you don’t know what to do on 21st September 2017, it might be worth to spend one day in Odessa and assist to this “international trading and shipping conference” set up by the good ISM team. Having a look at the program, the speakers and the attendees it seems few big guys putting their bets on the Black Sea market. and you where would you put your guess?

regards

Jerome

taste of the daily bread in shipping

Again today’s index showing all positive trend. On the BHSI, the above 500 marks is confirmed, nicely helped by the ECSA origin and the HS3 heading towards $10,500 rather quickly. Very limited amount of handies/handymax are able to call ECSA by the end of the Month. Charterers open there seems to be left with the only option to stay tune and jump on a vessel fixed and missing her cancelling. Hoping for their competitor to release the ship.

Supras (58kdwt) are heading to the 900mark, which if I’m not mistaken is the first time for this index to reach this level.

As we could expect, routes giving destination to USG are suffering from the local weather and Owners not even asking for a premium to heads up there, as they believe the storms are temporary events but with a rather long term impact and time shall pass on before ports being ready to work again and ship the cargoes.

On the continent, the rather low needs for ships is offset by a rather low avaibility of ships. 30,000 5pct bulk wheat stem Rouen to algeria was rumored by owners being done last week above $18 pmt when charterers were mentionning in the middish $17th.

Generally speaking, Eastern market is performing quite ok and this is inviting owners to remain open there unless charterers ready to pay for a premium for a repositioning in Atlantic (when this back haul used to be a cheap move).

Should some of you be wondering how hurricanes are handled by Master’s, please go follow the link here and you’ll see better for ships to be loaded rather than empty while facing rough conditions.

On the commodity market, as you know, Pelagos is fairly well connected on the rice (bulk and bags) seaborne transport, we still have a bit of work to be able to fix the about 20million tons exported worldwide, but be sure Jean-Charles here is working on it.

Yes rice is an important commodity within the (shipping) world, don’t forget Wheat is also another big one. Looking like the world wheat picture is moving fairly quickly with surely some impacts on the future shipping routes. Few articles to feed you here below

About the lovely Egyptians… buying but playing around

About the lovely Australians failing to harvest as much as last year

About the lovely Russians, producing more and more, and also consuming locally more and more

Enjoy your daily bread

rgds

Jerome