According to the weather forecast, it may snow today on February 9 (Thu) in Yokohama in morning. It is considerably chilly in the morning and the evening of this week, but I feel warm if there is not wind in the daytime. Spring comes over in a cycle of 3 cold days and 4 warm days in Japan. The flower of the plum at garden I watch on the way to work begins to bloom and tells us coming of spring.
Japanese 3 Shipping Lines have been doing their best to improve their financial situation. NYK announced their track record on January 31 that NYK becomes the black in a third-quarter of 2016, itself. A trade paper reports that MOL and K Line largely reduced deficits from the year before. The time has been for freight rate restoration among shipping lines after the unification of the shipping line, loading capacity adjustment under the new alliance since Hanjin Shipping bankruptcy at the end of Aug. 2016. It is said that shipping lines have already passed the worst period of time and entering into the recovery period.
There are some data to support it. The eastbound cargo from main 10 Asia countries and area to North America in 2016 has recorded high to rise by 3.5% to 14,640,089TEU compared with the previous year. Among them China, the greatest export country recorded the share of 61.3% of 8,971,111TEU, up 3.8% from a year ago. Japan is 528,654TEU to share 3.6% at the sixth place.
By the way if we look at the cargo movement from Japan to USA by port No. 1 is Tokyo Port with 209,063TEU rising by 9.4% compared with the previous year. No. 2 is Nagoya Port with 133,843TEU rising by 3.8%. No. 3 is Kobe Port with 104,484TEU rising by 2.5%. No. 4 is Yokohama Port with 29,384TEU decreasing by 7.5%. No. 5 is Shimizu Port with 26,539TEU decreasing by 7.5%. However, it is regretful to see Yokohama Port lowering their position of the trade port.
Cargo movement for eastbound from Asia to USA surpassed 10 million TEU a year for the first time. Westbound from USA to Asia between Jan and Nov in 2016 increased to 6,190,426TEU rising by 5.2% compared with the same period of the last year. It rose for seven months in a row. Cargo movement in Nov 2016 from Asia to Europe was 1,149,082TEU rising by 3.9% from a year ago. The trade paper reports that cargo movement from Jan to Nov in 2016 came to 13,741,490TEU to raise by 1.8% compared with the same period of the last year.
On the other hand, cargo movement among Asian 13 countries and area in 2016 decreased by 1.9% to 13,532,800TEU compared with the previous year. Dry cargo decreased by 2.3% to 12,749,700TEU in 2016 and Reefer cargo increased by 4.6% to 783,100TEU. Export from Japan to Asia in 2016 decreased by 11.1% to 1,475,800TEU from a year ago. Export from Asia to Japan increased by 1.5% to 2,212,200TEU from a year ago. Export of dry cargo itself decreased by 10.8% to 1,410,000TEU. Import increased by 0.5% to 2,069,500TEU. Export of Reefer cargo in 2016 decreased by 18.5% to 65,600TEU. Import of Reefer cargo increased by 18.3% to 142,726TEU.
The marine transport volume of the 2016 freshness product by Reefer Ship and Reefer Container was 1,008,500,000 tons. It is equivalent to 3,650,000 units by 40f Hi-cube conversion. Reefer product growth exceeds one of the dry cargo. The 2016 market share of Reefer cargo expanded to 4.3% from 2.7% of the last year. Reefer cargo has continuously been shifting to containerization. However, the number of Reefer container made in 2016 became 135,000TEU which fell 35% from a year ago reflecting Reefer market of the last year. The middle sized container shipping lines with the operation scale of 500,000 ~ 700,000TEU like OOCL, Yang Ming, Hyundai should be paid attention for a while where to go. 7 mega-carriers including the unification of Japanese 3 lines will disappear for the past one year. It is a matter of life and death to container leasing companies if the number of shipping companies decreases. It is because they will lose their customers to lease. Lease demand before Chinese New Year seemed so good that lack of container appears in China and Asia at present. It may be said that the leasing company has already hit the bottom of the hard time and has gotten into the recovery period as each leasing company seems to be recording the container utilization over 90%. The number of the new containers in Chinese container maker maintains over 500,000 TEU. New container price is $2,150 per 20f for solvent paint and $2,200 per 20f for water-based paint.
The major leasing companies have been positively and speculatively ordering the new containers before rising the container prices to secure their tool of containers to lease and owing to anticipating the economic recovery. In addition, we hear that half of their order of the new containers seem to have been booked by short term and long terms lease from shipping lines. The major leasing companies would have a great ability to forecast the future demand of shipping lines in any situation. They may see the bright future of the shipping industry in coming months.