Intermodal Dry Bulk Weekly Report

The BDI moved further down last week (291pts), fact that hardly took anyone by surprise as the lunar year holidays in Asia on top of the already depressed market almost no space for improvement in earnings yet again. Acti vity during the first half of the week was depressed across the board, while closer to Friday there was a sense that things had finally started moving a bit. The Panamax segment has been the only positi ve excep tion, over performing the rest of the market, with a small rebound in average earnings being noted. Given current levels, this upward reversal was of course no reason to pop open the champers, but despite the lack of significance it certainly signaled that rates for the segment could be booming. Whether this is true, will be more evident of course once Asian ac tivity resumes, while a shift in psychology will also be needed on behalf of owners in order to give this small posi tive reversal support to extend further into a more substanti al turnaround. Lack of acti vity in the beginning of the week together with rock bottom senti ment, has pushed rates for Capes south for yet another week, while period numbers reported in the market complete the very challenging mes ahead for the segment. Panamax rates out of ECSA were s ll gaining a premium over the rest of the market, as increased ac tivity led to slightly improved numbers in the region. In addi on, Rio Tinto is reported to be topping its bauxite produc on in northern Australia, which is definitely good news for the Panamax trade in the region that has suffered a lot on the back of depressed coal volumes. Handymax/Supramax tonnage saw less acti vity ex USG last week, while in the East very few orders added extra pressure to owners, who nonetheless seemed to be resisti ng to fix much lower. The Handysize market kept witnessing very thin ac tivity across both basins, while period enquiry for the geared sizes as a whole remains scarce.