Maritime activity

Containers, turnover falls in 2023 but is already recovering

Airline revenues fell by up to -65.2%. Traffic rebound in Q1 2024 (+9.2%)

by Raoul de Forcade

10 July 2024

3' min read

Key points

In 2023 stable traffic worldwide
New Alliances
Recovery

3' min read

Despite a physiological drop in turnover in 2023 (to -65.2%), due to lower freight rates, after the skyrocketing prices of 2022, in the first half of 2024 the large container shipping companies again managed to increase revenues and results; and trades rose again, marking +9.2%.

This is what emerges from the report The shipping companies: an economic-financial analysis - balance sheets', prepared, for the ninth consecutive year, by the study centre of Fedespedi (the national association of freight forwarders), with the aim of analysing the economic-financial performance of the main shipping companies.

In 2023, stable traffic worldwide

After the collapse in 2022 (-3.9% compared to 2021), in 2023, the report says, container traffic, globally, "remained substantially stable (+0.6%) reaching 176.2 million teu (20-foot containers, ndr). The stability of traffic worldwide also affected the level of demand and freight rates, which confirmed a downward trend: on average, the level of freight rates in 2023 was -50% compared to 2022'.

With regard to delays on scheduled arrival times at ports, 'the situation has progressively improved, with a clear decrease in them: according to data provided by Sea Intelligence, if at the beginning of 2022, only 30.4% of ships were on time, this percentage had risen to 66.8% in May 2023'.

New Alliances

A number of findings also emerge from the analysis. As of May 2024, "the fleet available to the 12 companies surveyed (i.e. Cosco, Oocl, Evergreen, Hapag-Lloyd, Hyundai Mm, Maersk, Wan Hai, Yang-Ming, Zim, One, plus Cma-Cgm - of which only some balance sheet and capacity data are examined, as it has not yet made its 2023 consolidated balance sheet public - and Msc, which does not make its balance sheets public and of which only capacity and fleet numbers are available) was amounting to 3,813 ships, 55% of the total container ships. The total capacity is about 25.4 million teu (85.4% of the total), with an average capacity per ship of 6,679 teu"..

The companies involved in the three major alliances (2M, Ocean Alliance and The Alliance) 'control 81.4 per cent of the capacity offer and 51.3 per cent of the ships'; and 'in January 2025, the 2M alliance (Maersk and Msc) will be dissolved: Maersk will form a new alliance called Gemini Cooperation, with Hapag Lloyd, which will exit The Alliance.

After an exceptional year such as 2022 (revenues of up to +400%), '2023 marked a clear downsizing of turnovers (caused by less movement and a sharp drop in freight rates), which recorded negative changes for all shipping companies, ranging from -36.9% to -65.2%'.

Invoiced sales on the upswing

As far as 2024 is concerned, however, the outbreak of war in Gaza and the continuation of attacks by the Houthis on ships in transit, "led to the diversion of the routes that passed through the Suez Canal towards the Cape of Good Hope, resulting in a strong upturn in freight rates, which in fact doubled in the space of a few weeks, compared to the average values of December 2023. Added to this phenomenon was the upturn in traffic in the first quarter of 2024 - 43.6 million teu in vs. 39.9 in the same period of 2023 (+9.2%) - to be ascribed above all to the growth in exports from Far Eastern countries".

In the end, 'the results obtained by the various companies differ significantly from each other, with some, especially the Asian ones, but also Zim (Israeli, ndr), managing to increase turnover and final results, even recovering negative situations from 2023.

Raoul de Forcaderedattore
Luogo: Genova
Lingue parlate: italiano, inglese
Argomenti: shipping, nautica, economia, finanza.
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