The idle container ship fleet has contracted again as the crises in the Red Sea and Panama Canal suck capacity into service diversions and distort the market, as new buildings arrive to alleviate tonnage crunch.
Alphaliner’s latest weekly report on the shipping market says that the idled fleet is now at its lowest level for more than 22 months at just 84 ships of which one is larger than 12,500 teu and none are greater than 18,000 teu.
Repair yards dropped
The number of vessels that are in repair yards has also dropped significantly over the last two weeks, falling to 99 ships on 12 February, totalling 236,266 teu, an average size of under 2,400 teu. A reduction of six ships, consisting of 73,769 teu, averaging around 12,300 teu per vessel.
Currently any new tonnage delivered is heading straight into the Asia to Europe trades to help carriers maintain services on the European trades out of Asia, which Alphaliner says requires at least two and in some cases three ships to maintain a weekly service trading around the Cape of Good Hope.
A lucky coincidence
As the first vessels to be diverted from Suez are now arriving back in Asia Alphaliner points to “a ‘lucky’ coincidence that the return of the first batch of diverted ships falls in the traditionally ‘slow’ period after Chinese New Year, when shipping lines tend to blank a number of sailings.”
According to the analyst the Ocean Alliance has struggled to find sufficient tonnage to cover its services, particularly into the Mediterranean. However, 2M has managed to keep blanked sailings to a minimum.
Most successful alliance
2M has been the most successful alliance in maintaining its services with a slew of newbuildings being deployed into the alliance’s Asia to Europe services.
In addition, THE Alliance was able to rapidly respond to the Red Sea crisis, given that it had already suspended its south Asia to Europe and Asia to USEC services in November, releasing 22 ships for the remaining diverted services, including those to the Mediterranean.
Chartering tonnage has also been a challenge as the charterers had few vessels to choose from, and Alphaliner reports that Danaos, a major non-operating owner (NOO), “Had secured additional charters for vessels at ‘very healthy levels’ due to the Red Sea situation as extra ton miles creates additional vessel demand. The NOO now has contract coverage for its fleet of 95.8% for 2024 and 62.0% for 2025.”
Danaos reported similar income for 2023, at $567.6 million compared to $563.8 million in 2022.
Although tonnage is currently tight, in what is the early stages of the diversion of tonnage around the Cape, Alphaliner acknowledges that with much more capacity to come the current situation remains fluid.
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Source : Sea trade
