Editor’s selection: Maersk’s bleak outlook, Black Sea port attack and box and retail giants falling short

Top story

Danish liner giant AP Moller-Maersk has emerged with a bleak prognosis for the container shipping market. Profits were sharply down in the first half of the year as the liner giant warned of a “subdued market outlook”.

Despite the gloomy outlook, the company raised its financial guidance after performing better than expected in the year to date.

In the news

Port attack | Sea-based drones have attacked Russian navy ships near the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, a key hub for the country’s oil exports, according to reports. Ship movements were temporarily halted as a result of what appeared to be the first Ukrainian attack on one of the main Russian commercial ports.

Decarbonisation report | Analysis by US environmental campaigners has revealed that most container lines and major retailers are failing to deliver on even minimal commitments to decarbonisation. The Ship It Zero coalition’s study of major players’ policies revealed that only one line out of 10 had a target date of 2040 for decarbonisation, and only three out of 18 retailers specifically reported their shipping emissions.

Fremantle Highway | The Fremantle Highway fire in the North Sea is set to chalk up another major loss for hull underwriters and put pressure on rates, particularly in the car carrier sector. The hull of the Shoei Kisen Kaisha-owned, 6,210-ceu Fremantle Highway (built 2013) is valued at about $78m, but the long-running salvage and firefighting operation will also push up the final claims bill significantly for the ship’s hull underwriters.

Crude price cap | Western shipping interests remain involved in lifting Urals crude from Russian ports despite the key export grade rising to nearly $10 above the G7 oil price cap, tracking data suggests. Rising prices and reduced cargoes have encouraged Greek owners to look elsewhere after three consecutive weeks when Urals breached the $60 crude cap imposed on 5 December by Western nations opposed to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, say analysts.

Bulker inflection point | Private Scorpio Holdings has revealed a 5.33% holding in fellow product tanker owner Ardmore Shipping, but it does not appear to be consolidation that is on the mind of the Monaco-based outfit. Rather, Scorpio is inspired by what it considers “an inflection point” in clean product rates over the past couple of weeks and has also ramped up its holding in a second peer — Hafnia Tankers of Denmark — according to Scorpio Tankers president Robert Bugbee.

In-depth

Prices for European Union carbon credits are widely expected to rise in the years ahead, but what must go up may first come down in a volatile market.

Shipping companies have already started buying the credits known as EU allowances, or investing in futures, as they gear up for inclusion in the Emissions Trading System on 1 January.

But a variety of factors, including the European power sector’s pullback from coal imports, could impact demand for carbon credits in the months ahead.

Read the story in full here.

Interview

Nitzeira Watson Stewart’s first exposure to the maritime world was a punishment for bad behaviour. When she was a rebellious teenager, her father felt she needed more strict rules, so he enrolled her in a maritime high school in Panama City.

TradeWinds’ Eric Priante Martin found out how she managed to get ahead in the industry. You can read the full interview here.

And finally...

This week’s Streetwise financial newsletter looked back on the life and times of former shipping equity analyst Natasha Boyden.

Boyden was one of the first bank analysts covering the budding public sector in the 2000s and almost certainly the first woman to do so in any consistent way. Industrious, well connected and fair are some of the adjectives applied to her work.