Late deliveries of containership newbuildings will decrease compared to the past three years.
That is the view of consultancy firm Alphaliner in a market commentary which concludes that slippage rates are set to decline after the high levels seen recently that have helped to keep a lid on annual fleet expansion numbers.
Since the industry crisis began in 2008, the delivery dates of many ships on order have been pushed back, helping to slow year-on-year capacity increases and stabilise the market.
In 2009, only 57% of the 1.87m teu scheduled for delivery was actually handed over, Alphaliner estimates, with slippage of 43%.
The following year, slippage was estimated at 34%, with actual deliveries totalling 66% of what had been expected back in January 2009.
In 2011, slippage is forecast by Alphaliner to be down to 25%, with the firm predicting that cancellations and deferrals “will no longer play a significant part” in reducing the level of new containership deliveries.
The firm had originally forecast 1.81m teu of deliveries for 2011, then scaled that number right back, but has now made an upwards adjustment to 1.36m teu as slippage slows.
Alphaliner’s new forecast for 2011 deliveries are not far off those of Clarksons that has also been keeping as close watch on slippage and has accordingly revised its 2011 delivery forecast up to a little over 1.2m teu from closer to 1m teu previously.
Alphaliner also reports that the idle containership fleet fell last month to 111,000 teu or 0.7% of the fleet. Reactivation of larger ships has left only 15 ships of 2,000 teu or larger unemployed. Most of those now inactive are smaller than 2,000 teu.