The boom in container shipping is firing up demand for some of the world’s smallest commodity-hauling vessels. With rates to hire for 20-foot steel boxes soaring this year, charterers are looking to the smallest ships to cut costs. It has helped push products like steel, aluminum, and grain, which would normally be shipped in containers, into small bulk carriers. The move means that earnings of some of the world’s largest bulk carriers, the so-called capesizes, are now lower than tiny ones. Capesize vessels earned about $27,000 a day on Thursday, while handysize vessels made $32,000 a day. “We are carrying cargoes that have come out of containers,” said Jan Rindbo, CEO of DS Norden, which has a fleet of handysize tanks. “It’s a trend we have seen for most of this year, where, relatively speaking, smaller ship types have overtaken capesizes.” Rindbo said that among the cargoes that his company has been carrying have included grains and aluminum ingots. They would normally be shipped in containers, he said.
Sources: Valor/Portos e Navios (*Translated by Ia Niani)