Mon Sep 10, 2012
Sept 10 (Reuters) - The Baltic Exchange's main sea freight index, tracking rates for ships carrying dry commodities, fell on Monday as panamax vessel rates continued a losing streak.
The main index, which factors in the average daily earnings of capesize, panamax, supramax and handysize dry bulk transport vessels, fell 3 points or 0.45 percent to 666 points.
The overall index, which gauges the cost of shipping commodities such as iron ore, cement, grain, coal and fertiliser, has fallen about 62 percent this year.
The Baltic's panamax index dropped 17 points or 2.84 percent at 582 points.
Earnings for panamaxes, which usually transport 60,000 to 70,000 tonne cargoes of coal or grains, have fallen about 65 percent this year. The rates for panamaxes were down $139 at $4,619 on Monday.
The Baltic's capesize index rose 2 points or 0.17 percent to 1,188 points.
Average earnings for capesizes, which typically transport 150,000 tonne cargoes such as iron ore and coal, were up $33 to $3,485.
Shipments of iron ore account for about a third of seaborne volumes on the larger capesizes, and brokers said price developments remained a key factor for dry freight.
Top consumer China's imports of iron ore in August rose 7.9 percent from the previous month to a three-month high of 62.45 million tonnes, data showed on Monday, with buyers turning to the international market as a collapse in prices forced domestic producers to slash output.
Also, China's economic planning body on Friday approved projects to build highways, ports and airport runways, that analysts estimate at more than 1 trillion yuan ($158 billion), roughly a quarter the size of the massive stimulus package unleashed in response to the global financial crisis in 2008.
"Steel mills have built down inventories at mill and are said to be increasing purchases - leading to a short-term positive outlook," Arctic Securities analyst Erik Nikolai Stavseth said in a note.
"We see this favouring dry bulk stocks in the near-term from a momentum perspective, but maintain our fundamentally cautious outlook," Stavseth added.
Growing ship supply has been outpacing commodity demand for quite sometime now and is widely expected to cap dry bulk freight rate gains in the coming months.
Average daily earnings for handysize ships were up $40 to $6,725, while those for supramax ships were down $51 to $8,652.
(Reporting by Koustav Samanta in Bangalore, editing by William Hardy)
Sept 10 (Reuters) - The Baltic Exchange's main sea freight index, tracking rates for ships carrying dry commodities, fell on Monday as panamax vessel rates continued a losing streak.
The main index, which factors in the average daily earnings of capesize, panamax, supramax and handysize dry bulk transport vessels, fell 3 points or 0.45 percent to 666 points.
The overall index, which gauges the cost of shipping commodities such as iron ore, cement, grain, coal and fertiliser, has fallen about 62 percent this year.
The Baltic's panamax index dropped 17 points or 2.84 percent at 582 points.
Earnings for panamaxes, which usually transport 60,000 to 70,000 tonne cargoes of coal or grains, have fallen about 65 percent this year. The rates for panamaxes were down $139 at $4,619 on Monday.
The Baltic's capesize index rose 2 points or 0.17 percent to 1,188 points.
Average earnings for capesizes, which typically transport 150,000 tonne cargoes such as iron ore and coal, were up $33 to $3,485.
Shipments of iron ore account for about a third of seaborne volumes on the larger capesizes, and brokers said price developments remained a key factor for dry freight.
Top consumer China's imports of iron ore in August rose 7.9 percent from the previous month to a three-month high of 62.45 million tonnes, data showed on Monday, with buyers turning to the international market as a collapse in prices forced domestic producers to slash output.
Also, China's economic planning body on Friday approved projects to build highways, ports and airport runways, that analysts estimate at more than 1 trillion yuan ($158 billion), roughly a quarter the size of the massive stimulus package unleashed in response to the global financial crisis in 2008.
"Steel mills have built down inventories at mill and are said to be increasing purchases - leading to a short-term positive outlook," Arctic Securities analyst Erik Nikolai Stavseth said in a note.
"We see this favouring dry bulk stocks in the near-term from a momentum perspective, but maintain our fundamentally cautious outlook," Stavseth added.
Growing ship supply has been outpacing commodity demand for quite sometime now and is widely expected to cap dry bulk freight rate gains in the coming months.
Average daily earnings for handysize ships were up $40 to $6,725, while those for supramax ships were down $51 to $8,652.
(Reporting by Koustav Samanta in Bangalore, editing by William Hardy)
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