A SHORTAGE of container vessels by 2012 is forecast by Macquarie Equities Research because the newbuilding orderbook hits a 10-year low, said London's International Freighting Weekly.

Macquarie, in its latest Vital Signs shipping report, found that the current containership orderbook would produce a 10 per cent increase in the global fleet's size next year, but go down to six per cent growth in 2012.

"Based on our view that volumes will achieve minimum growth of eight per cent a year, so we are potentially facing a shortage of capacity in 2012," said the authors.

"Due to solid deliveries year-to-date, the orderbook has fallen to 26.4 per cent of the cellular fleet from 36.1 per cent in January and a peak of 64.2 per cent in November 2007," said Macquarie.

Many in the industry saw supply and demand return to balance in 2015 a year ago. However, many carriers have recorded operational gains in the first half due to the demand boom and the use of slow-steaming strategies, particularly on intra-Asia and Asia-Europe routes, resulting in earlier than expected return to profit.

Carriers tended to invest the profits into new ships, but new ordering has been slow this time because of concerns about financing, especially for non-vessel operating owners.

"Of the orders placed this year, only 23 per cent have come from non-operating owners," said Macquarie.

Weakened financing ability and the reduced participation of non-operating owners will curtail the new-building orderbook next year, it said. "We believe that if there is any sign of greater-than-expected softness in demand, the industry will respond with extra-slow-steaming."
(Source:www.schednet.com)