Car carrier owners appear unfazed by the European Union’s recent decision to slap tariffs on Chinese-built electric cars.
Owners including Hoegh Autoliners’ Andreas Enger and Wallenius Wilhelmsen’s Lasse Kristoffersen said the market will remain “stronger for longer,” during a seminar hosted by ABG Sundal Collier.
“In particular, the panel discussed the demand for transportation that is currently being met by containers and bulkers rather than car carriers, due to the shortage of car carrier capacity out of Asia,” a summary of the event published by the bank on Friday read.
The seminar was only open to ABG Sundal Collier clients.
Car carrier players have been working to battle back bad news as of late.
In addition to the tariffs, passed last week, the orderbook stands at more than 200 vessels.
This has prompted many to suggest the boom cycle — where spot rates stood north of $100,000 per day for the last two years — was coming to a close.
According to the summary, Enger and Kristoffersen, plus fellow panellists Gram Car Carriers chief executive Georg Whist and SFL Corp head Ole Hjertaker, said newbuilding capacity would be used to get those cars out of containers and off bulkers.
Whist said the market is short the 113 vessels necessary to fill the need coming out of China.
Chinese electric vehicle exports have been a factor in the market reaching six-figure heights, plus demand and fleet supply.
The EU anti-subsidy investigation into the vehicles, which began last October, was initially thought to be political posturing but ended up with the European Commission approving taxes as high as 35.3% on the them.
The exact rate depends on the automaker.
