Due to weak financing support and transport demand, newbuilding market is likely to continue the downturn in 2013. Accroding to statistics from a shipbroker, only 60% of domestic shipyards own order catalog after 2013.
According to ICAP, 2013 will be an inflection year for most Chinese shipyards although some of them managed to get new orders for the following three years.
In its last report in 2012, ICAP pointed out that many Chinese shipyards will be likely to face bankruptcy in 2013. 38% of Chinese builders failed to receive any order in 2012 and about 10% will have no ship to build after 2012.
In Japan, about 30% of the shipyards received no order in the last year, while the proportion of Korean shipyards is only 10%. Many shipyards in China building small bulk carriers will have to construct vessels at a loss without subsidies. Besides, the changes of exchange rates will possibly make original profitable project loss money in the end.
ICAP also say that about 30% of new orders delivered in 2012 failed to get full financing, which further explained why about 30% new vessels failed to hit water in last year.
According to ICAP, ship financing market will not see significant improvement in 2013. The delayed newbuilging projects also face uncertain future in the coming year. As a result, the newbuilding market in 2013 is like to remain current momentum.
In a word, ICAP consider 2013 as the year to “settle old scores” unless the shipping market see unexpected upturn.