Seminar of the Youth Group of Assagenti on the boom of maritime freight

With regard to the sector of the transport of liquid bulk, it is it has been noted that this market has suffered two upward peaks for very different and all exogenous reasons: boycotts, tensions geopolitics, Covid, war in Ukraine. At the end of 2019 the need of oil storage on floating ships due to scarcity in the hold, due to the 2020 IMO emissions adjustment and several diplomatic incidents - it has been observed - caused an increase in freight rates to over 300 thousand dollars a day for VLCC supertankers. With Covid the price of oil is collapsed, but the race to grab ships to grab store crude oil, attractive because it is at a low price, but not consumable immediately. Finally, after a stable 2021, we have recorded only one other episode of freight, last month, due to the war in Ukraine, but it was only a phenomenon regional and that has touched more the Aframax ships than the larger flow rates. It has also been noted that the war could create in the long run a situation favorable to the shipowners, as a temporary closure of a boarding area induces traders to buy alternative crude from other areas and, if the alternative crude oil comes from further away, the application for hold and shipowners will be able to request more freight High.

As for solid bulk, it was specified that the freight boom is linked to the block of the logistical gear to which one was accustomed: the just-in-time, that with Covid it was no longer possible. In addition, the new techniques related to compliance with the "green" directives have cooled shipowners' investments in construction of new ships and the increase in the cost of fuel has influenced further.

Finally, with regard to containerised maritime transport, in the course of the seminar it was emphasized that they are verified conditions that had not occurred for a long time in this market: after the lockdown the world demand is growth of +9.3% and in 2022 the expected figure is positive although not at this level. This in the context of maritime supply chain dysfunctions, with reliability of the schedules of the departures of the ships that is below 50% for all carriers, whereas previously it was achieved at 80-90%, and with port terminals that are congested. An analysis - that of the Youth of Assagenti, like similar ones of shipowners' organizations and their representatives - which is presumably will not agree shippers and shippers, for some time critical of the assessments of the effects of market conditions on freight formulated by the companies of navigation.