Sales and valuation of panamax boxships make a comeback

    Research from Vessels Value shows that the unloved panamax sector saw a return to form last year with both the total volume of sales and valuation of vessels rising.

    The total number of 3,000 TEU-5,000 TEU classic panamaxes being traded per month rose to new monthly peaks in 2017. "activity has tapered off at the start of 2018, but the current value of a 10-year-old ship at US$15.74 million is still discounted when compared with the five-year ($18.32 million) and 25-year ($37.13 million) median values," VesselsValue said.

    The value of a fixed-age five-year-old 4,275 TEU classic panamax doubled during 2017 to $15.7 million.

    Navios Maritime Containers was the leading buyer, although some of these were shifted from other Navios group companies after originally being acquired from Rickmers Maritime. Additional units were bought from German owners or banks.

    "There were many other transactions in 2017, and Greek, Norwegian, and American buyers comprised the top three nationalities of investors taking exposure to the panamax markets," VesselsValue said.

    Sales volumes had been driven by time charter rates improving following a collapse at the start of 2016 and rationalisation of fleet size was encouraging higher returns for the remaining ships, which were still needed to service smaller trading hubs.

    In addition, a dearth of newbuildings in the sector meant that there was little likelihood of capacity growing again. No orders for ships between 3,000 TEU and 11,000 TEU have been placed since the beginning of this year.

    Nevertheless, classic panamaxes still face headwinds from the persistent low rates that have plagued the entire container fleet, reports UK's Lloyd's Loading List.

Asia-Europe rate drops 9.7pc to US$827/TEU, off 11.3pc to USWC

    Spot rates for shipping containers from Asia to northern Europe in the week ending Friday dropped 9.7 per cent to US$827 per TEU, according to the Shanghai Containerised Freight Index (SCFI).

    Asia-Mediterranean trade declined 9.5 per cent to $721 per TEU, London's Loadstar reported.

    Asia to the US west coast plunged 11.3 per cent week-over-week to $1,252 per FEU while those to the east coast down 12.3 per cent to $2,375 per FEU.

US Customs breaks out champagne over ACE, but shippers slow to party

    US customs and Border Protection (CBP) appear to be breaking out the champagne over an "historic milestone" in deploying the "last of the major scheduled core trade processing capabilities in the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE)".

    This celebretory tone comes after a raft of criticisms that the ACE auto customs clearance system is US$1 billion over budget and doesn't work.

    ACE was designed to streamline data flow to US Customs, but is filled with flaws after three years, says the National Customs Brokers and Forwarders Association of America (NCBFAA).

    It has called for remedial action, as its members process 97 per cent of all data entries for imports to the US, reports London's Loadstar.

    But US Customs insists ACE is doing the job of streamlining the import/export process into a "single window" that allows businesses to electronically transmit the data required by the US Government to import or export cargo.

    "More than 5.3 million lines of code were developed in order to automate all phases of cargo processing - pre-arrival, arrival, post release, exports, and partner government agency (PGA) integration - into ACE," said the US Customs press release.

    Said Acting Customs Commissioner Kevin McAleenan: "This deployment of ACE is a significant achievement for CBP, the trade community and PGAs who have worked tirelessly to implement the "single window" for over 15 years.

    "It has been one of the most complex IT projects the federal government has ever undertaken and required strong partnerships and collaboration across government and industry," he said.

    But according to the NCBFAA paper, ACE is not capable of providing a stable release date for border clearances. There are problems with remote location filing, currency conversion for duties and value declaration as well as insufficient automation of the invoice interface.

    On the post-clearance side, the paper points to "ongoing and often uncommunicated" changes in the reconciliation function and the removal of protest filings from CBP's Automated Broker Interface.

    Communication is also an issue with the messages that ACE sends out. The NCBFAA is calling for a complete list of ACE messages and their meanings.

    The NCBFAA described the messaging system as "duplicative, inconsistent and prone to incorrect interpretation by CBP and stakeholders".

    US Airforwarders Association executive director Brandon Fried said the NCBFAA's "white paper was an eye opener", adding that the flow of messages about delays and system down times emanating from ACE suggests that the platform is far from stable.

Asia Pacific Shipping