Buy ships now before prices rise: Stopford

Now is the time to delve into the S&P market before prices start to creap up, the world’s most famous shipping analyst, Dr Martin Stopford, told delegates attending a conference in Shanghai today.

News ID: 58742

Date: 04 December 2015 - 11:08

According to MANA, The president of Clarkson Platou Research Services noted how many owners he had been speaking with in the past couple of weeks had been saying they were waiting until early next year to make investments. Stopford advised executives attending the Senior Maritime Forum at Marintec China that this was a mistake. “Prices today are very competitive, and there are ships on the market too,” Stopford said. Five-year-old aframaxes are priced at $37m now and similarly aged panamax bulkers are going for $15m, the author of Maritime Economics said.
Stopford discussed the dry bulk trades, dismissing some who compare today’s markets with the depths of the bear markets of the 1980s.
“The 1980s was a much more aggressive market than we have today,” Stopford said, suggesting the average earnings level today is more like the 1990s: “Difficult but not life threatening”.
Turning to China, Stopford noted that this year the republic’s seaborne imports and exports will peak out, the first time there has been a decline since 1998.

Concluding, Stopford looked at the shipbuilding sector, and warned that tough times are likely to continue for the sector, with the analyst suggesting there was as much as a 45% overcapacity in shipyards.
“Overcapacity is likely to create commercial pressures,” Stopford warned.