The future of the Capesize dry bulk market appears to be engulfed from mixed “feelings” among analysts and market participants, despite the fact of the relatively positive performance of late.

The “pessimists”, as described by shipbroker Allied Shipbroking’s latest weekly report, are negative regarding the future prospects of the Capesize market, at least during the first half of 2015, while things are not looking much better for 2015 as a whole. According to Mr. George Lazaridis, Head of Market Research & Asset Valuations, the arguments expressed claim that “with the steel industry being considerably shaken up after the softer results witnessed out of China throughout the year, the market has found itself once again plagued by overcapacity in terms of vessels and excess supply of steel products, possibly marking a further slowdown in steel production growth. Having now en-ered the final month of 2014 and with rates in the final quarter of the year having grossly disappointed the expectations that had accrued from the more promising final quarter of 2013, the market has now been left in shatters in terms of market sentiment, while the headache of the excessive order book continues to loom in the horizon”.

By contrast, those who voice more optimistic views, say that things could very well be better. According to them, “iron ore trade and in particular seaborne trade, has been mainly driven by Chinese demand for almost a dec-ade now and while demand for steel production may well be faltering, it doesn’t not look like we will see an outright reduction in demand for this vital commodity. At the same time, with prices of the ore having dropped to consecutively record 5 year lows over the past months, it has been Chinese internal iron ore production that has been most at threat. Both Australia and Brazil have considerably lower breakeven levels and can sustain their production at price levels considerably lower than their Chinese counterparts. This means that as the price drops further it will likely be seaborne imports that will have most to gain boosting their demand and as such their volumes”, Lazaridis noted.

He added that according to the optimists of the dry bulk market, “the considerable iron ore inventories that have amassed in most major Chinese ports are likely to be consumed fairly quickly by the ramped up Chinese steel produc-tion and at the same time the average levels of port inventories will have to be raised in order to better secure against any disruptions in production as they will be more reliant on imports moving forward”.

As a results, Allied’s analyst wonders which will be the case out of the above different scenarios. According to him, “there may well be an increasing rise for iron ore imports, however Australia has championed as main supplier to China for many years and as things are looking now, they have been gaining further ground during 2014, moving from a 51% market share in 2013 up to roughly a 58% market share now. This means that as their mines ramp up production and gain ground in the market they will likely eat up some of the further away competition as well, countering some of the positive effects of the higher reliance of China on imports, as Aussie ore also takes up volume from longer haul sources as well”.

According to the shipbroker’s view on the 2015 dry bulk market, “as things stand now it looks as a reasonable scenario for Chinese iron ore imports to rise by around 10-15% on a year-on-year ba-sis, while to put this number in perspective the respective number for 2014 looks close to around 16%. Having said that, this rise in imports is possibly going to translate into a more marginal 5% demand growth and even this figure seems to be optimistic. At the same time the schedule of newbuilding deliveries is quite well packed with over 139 vessels currently set to hit the water within 2015, while the lower bunker prices might add another headache as fuel consumption becomes less of an issue and many charter-ers start to push for higher speeds and in turn further increase the total annual carrying capacity of the Capesize fleet”, he concluded.

Source: Hellenic Shipping News Worldwide