Shipbuilding yards increase their stake in the capesize bulk carrier order-book by 3 pct in 2009

Chinese shipbuilding yards increased their stake in the capesize bulk carrier order-book by 3% last year, effectively downsizing the volume of contracts in South Korea and Japan. “Today, China’s shipyards are building 50% of all capesizes on order by deadweight, equivalent to 530 ships and a 3% increase in market share since last February,” French broker Barry Rogliano Salles said in its latest weekly report.
“By contrast, South Korea’s share has dropped from 25% to 23%, while Japan has dipped slightly from 21% to 20%.”
With 191 capes contracted in South Korea and 189 in Japan, however, they still occupy a large portion of the order-book.
The news that China has increased its capesize order-book comes despite a large number of forecasts made last year that a significant number of newly established start-up yards in the country would fail to begin construction and many orders would be lost if they were closed.
“For some players, the prospect of the enforced closure of new greenfield yards represents a key chance for the shipping market to regulate itself and reduce the influx of new tonnage,” the BRS report said.
“So far, however, we have seen relatively little evidence of widespread closures in China, where most of the greenfield yards are located.”
Although it holds more than double the number of contracts in South Korea, the capesize bulk carriers on order in China are generally of a smaller size, of around 155,000 dwt.
This contrasts with South Korean yards, where the average size of vessels on order tops 200,000 dwt, BRS said.
“After the "big three”, the Philippines and Turkey remain out in front among the smaller shipyards,” the report added.
“In the past year, the Philippines has actually doubled its order-book as a share of the world market, although Turkey remains static at 1% of the global portfolio.”
“Romania, Taiwan, Ukraine and Denmark make up the remaining countries, with respectively seven, seven, five and three capes [size vessels] on order.”