News

Fracht Australia Logistics News - April 2025

1/4/2025

AROUND THE WORLD 

• LIEGE AIRPORT WANTS TO GROW as a main hub for flowers, but funding and education are needed to help European airports improve perishables handling. After capacity cuts at Schiphol Airport, flower shippers have looked to surrounding secondary hubs, like Maastricht, Liege, Ostend, Brussels, Frankfurt and Paris, to fly their product and then truck it to its destination. Supply chain specialists have reported that there was a lack of knowledge by ground handlers, and that most of these hubs lack the required facilities.
• E-COMMERCE WAVE TRIGGERS TERMINAL CONSTRUCTION AT MONTEVIDEO AIRPORT. The arrival of Chinese e-tailer Temu in Uruguay has set the ground for a courier terminal at Montevideo’s Carrasco International Airport. Latin America Cargo City (LACC), the airport’s logistics operator, is spending over $10m on construction of a 5,000 sq metre building designed to accommodate the rapid growth of e-commerce traffic.
• MSC PORT ARM to buy Hutchison ports including Panama and Felixstowe. MSC’s port operating arm Terminal Investment Ltd (TiL) is set to assume full control of the UK’s largest container gateway, Felixstowe, along with a host of other hubs around the world – including Panama Ports Company. A consortium comprising TiL and hedge fund giant BlackRock agreed to purchase some 80% of Hong Kong terminal operator Hutchison’s global operations.
• LE HAVRE ‘DELIGHTED’ as Hapag-Lloyd buys into box terminal. Hapag-Lloyd’s port business, Hanseatic Global Terminals (HGT), has acquired a 60% share in Compagnie Nouvelle de Manutentions Portuaires Le Havre (CNMP LH), which operates the Atlantique terminal at the French gateway of Le Havre. Crucially, the terminal is host to the one Gemini service that partners Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd put into Le Havre, the Europe Shuttle 6, which deploys one 2,750 TEU (twenty foot equivalent unit) vessel in a Rotterdam-Antwerp-Le Havre-Rotterdam string.
• US ATTACKS HEIGHTEN RED SEA TENSIONS. Tensions in the Red Sea are on the rise again with the US launching airstrikes against Houthi military sites in Yemen as a Houthi spokesperson threatened to escalate attacks on shipping. The Houthi-run Health Ministry said 53 people had been killed in the attacks and 98 were injured. The Houthis have vowed to retaliate. The news is a new blow to the Suez Canal Authority (SCA), as it dented hopes for a resumption of the Suez Canal transits by container lines.
• RECORD REVENUE FOR DP WORLD. DP World has reported a record $20 billion revenue and record EBITDA of $5.5 billion for 2024. In a release announcing the new records, the UAE-based company said revenue had grown by 9.7%, mainly due to improved performance from ports and terminals and contributions from new acquisitions and concessions. Adjusted EBITDA grew by 6.7% with an EBITDA margin for the year at 27.2%, but profit for the year of $1.5 billion was down by 2%, mainly due to higher finance costs. 

SEAFREIGHT NEWS 

• CMA CGM POSTS ‘SOLID’ 2024 RESULTS, broadly similar to those of AP Møller Maersk (APMM), but warned of a difficult year to come. The French shipping group, which has now integrated Bolloré Logistics into its CEVA subsidiary, said the results were “solid”, with revenues up 18%, to $55.5bn – the same as rival APMM. EBITDA was up 49%, to $13.4bn, pipping Maersk’s $12.1bn. But while net profit rose some $2bn, to $5.71bn, APMM hit $6.09bn.
• CONGESTION AT ASIAN AND EUROPEAN PORTS keeping charter rates firm. Bottlenecks at Asian and European ports are delaying nearly 10% of all container shipping capacity. This, along with the 6.5% tied up by Red Sea diversions, is supporting charter rates to remain firm.
• OOCL RESULTS POINT TO LOSS OF MARKET SHARE. Elevated freight rates over the course of last year nearly doubled Hong Kong-based COSCO subsidiary OOCL profits, according to the firm’s financial results released today. The carrier saw revenues grow some 25%, to $10.7bn, for the year, compared with the $8.3bn it earned in 2023, while operating profit came in at $2.6bn in 2024, compared with the $1.4bn profit the year before. However, its volumes and capacity were pretty static year on year: it carried a total of 7.59m TEU, a 3% increase on 2023, and half the rate of the global volume growth of circa-6%, suggesting the carrier lost market share over the year.
• TAIWANESE LINER OPERATOR, EVERGREEN, has reported a jump in revenue of 68% year on year turning over TW$463 billion in 2024. Net profit, at TW$139.45 billion, was up 58% compared to 2023 (TW$35/34 billion) which Evergreen reported was due to freight rates reaching post-Covid highs and the Red Sea conflict.
• SOUTHERN INDIA’S OCEAN TRADE continues to be a challenging market for both Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd, with the pair cutting back port calls. According to industry sources, the Gemini Cooperation partners have pared down the loading space they share on a direct call at Ennore port (Chennai) for Europe trades, which began in early February. The new joint loop, branded ME2 by Maersk and IEX by Hapag-Lloyd, is the only long-haul mainline operation out of India’s east coast, with most cargo generally transhipped over Sri Lanka’s Colombo port or Singapore.
• THE GEMINI ALLIANCE HAS DROPPED below its targeted 90% reliability for the first time since its launch, and is on “a downward trend”, according to analysts at liner database eeSea. The platform’s latest two weeks of data, which now include Gemini’s first head-haul arrivals into North America, show that while reliability remains high, “the downward trend unfortunately continues”.
• HAPAG-LLOYD REPORTS SOLID RESULTS in 2024 and a good start to 2025. The German container shipping line carried a total of 12.4m TEU, a 4.7% increase over the 11.9m TEU it lifted in 2023, while the global market, according to Container Trade Statistics (CTS), grew 6.2% during the same period. However, the company said its results “significantly exceeded expectations at the beginning of the year”, reporting a 6.6% increase in group revenues, to $20.7bn last year, compared with $19.4bn in 2023, on the back of strong demand for both liner and terminal activities. Group EBITDA was up marginally, at $5bn, and group EBIT came in at $2.8bn, $100m above 2023.
• RECORD YEAR FOR WALLENIUS WILHELMSEN with their 2024 financial performance surpassing its record 2023, the company revealed in releasing its annual report in Oslo recently. Adjusted EBITDA for 2024 was USD 1,901 million, up from USD 1,807 million in 2023. This resulted in a ROCE (return on capital employed) of 19.9%, an equity ratio at 39.5% and a leverage ratio of 0.9. Net profit in 2024 was USD 1,065 million compared to USD 967 million in 2023. 

AIRFREIGHT NEWS 

• AIR CARGO DEMAND GROWTH slowed again in January, which marked the 18th consecutive month of growth for the air cargo industry, however the rate of improvement continues to decelerate so yields and cargo load factors are down. Total demand, measured in cargo tonne-kilometers (CTK), rose by 3.2% compared to January 2024 levels, the latest data from IATA shows. However, growth rates have been decelerating since September. Capacity, measured in available cargo tonne-kilometers (ACTK), increased by 6.8% compared to January 2024. Meanwhile, Cargo Load Factor (CLF) declined to 43.9%, the lowest in 17 months.
• FIRST SIGNS OF E-COMMERCE UNCERTAINTY in February airfreight figures. Figures released today by data provider Xeneta show that in February air cargo demand increased by 4% year on year, the dynamic load factor was flat at 59% and the average spot freight rate was up 10%. However, Xeneta chief airfreight officer Niall van de Wouw said that there was also a “taste of what’s to come” with stricter rules around e-commerce shipments when rates from Shanghai to the US fell by 29% month on month in February. Van de Wouw said that Shanghai was likely to be the origin to first see the impact of lower e-commerce volumes.
• CATHAY PACIFIC CAUTIOUS BUT OPTIMISTIC following strong 2024. Cathay Cargo saw cargo revenues, volumes and yields increase last year, although the company is “cautiously monitoring” the impact of geopolitical developments. The freighter operator saw cargo revenues increase 8.3% last year to HK$24bn on the back of a 10.9% increase in cargo volumes to 1.5m tonnes and a 5% improvement in revenue freight tonne km to 8.5bn.
• LUFTHANSA CARGO IS PREDICTING that the air cargo market will grow in 2025 despite market volatility fuelled by geopolitical events while capacity is expected to come under pressure. Speaking during a webinar, Heike Woerner, senior director business development, said the Frankfurt-hubbed airline is expecting cargo demand to increase by between 3-5% this year, fuelled by expectations of 3.3% economic growth and emerging markets improvements, such as Vietnam and India, where GDP is expected to increase by 4.3%. She pointed out that geopolitical events continued to create uncertainty in the market, while European carriers continued to face airspace restrictions over Russia, which increased costs and flight duration. 

OCEANIA PORTS 

• THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT has committed almost $17million to a new maritime skills and training initiative that will give up to 20 trainee seafarers each year, for four years, access to berths to complete sea time required for international certification. The funding was announced by infrastructure and transport minister Catherine King on 4 March at the Australian Maritime College in Launceston and will support the Government’s maritime Strategic Fleet and the broader industry. It was quickly welcomed by peak industry body MIAL.
• QUBE SIGNS FERTILISER DEAL THROUGH WHYALLA PORT. A Multi-Million dollar investment by Agfert Fertilizers has secured a deal with QUBE to import fertilisers through Whyalla Port. The South Australian fertiliser company is establishing a new fertiliser supply chain across the Eyre Peninsula.The contract with QUBE involves unloading imported fertiliser from overseas suppliers directly through the Whyalla Port. 

CUSTOMER SERVICE 

If you would like further information about any of the above items, please contact one of our friendly Fracht Team members at fracht@frachtsyd.com.au