The three major shipbuilding countries are absolutely in different moods nowadays. So far this year South Korea shipyards are thriving by winning armful orders. China is making a long arm to support its shipbuilding industry by issuing a series of policies to encourage shipyards to develop offshore plants and other high value-added vessels as well as to comply with new international regulations and standards. On the other hand, Japanese shipbuilding industry is now in a dilemma of being expelled out of the market by S. Korea and China. Recently, S. Korea almost sweeps all mega and high value-added vessels as LNG carrier, offshore plants and big boxships with overwhelming superiority while China still keeps its advantage in bulker sector and inks most orders. The yen appreciation makes things even worse.
As the shipping market continues to slump, insiders are mostly pessimistic about market predictions. However, according to the S&P database of Eshiptrading, domestic secondhand trading activities show are experiencing an upturn in August. Product tanker demands and freight rates are all on a rise, turning the former bearish tone. Despite for the declining containership and bulker freight rates internationally, domestic demands for bulk carriers are till strong, which is greatly related with bulkers’ traditional advantage in Chinese market. Nevertheless, China would have to enhance its strength in offshore and other high-value added vessel types to keep its share in the global market.
Bulk carriers also dominate the secondhand supply market as Eshiptrading statistics shows, especially Japan handymax and Panamax bulkers built in later 90s. Most of the supplies are from overseas which demonstrates the international grim bulk shipping market and overcapacity are still going on. However this is a good chance for domestic buyers to carry out bottom-fishing. Supplied secondhand vessels’ average age are relatively young with mostly being built after 2007.
Statistics show that from 2011 to 2015, investments in deep-sea energy exploration and development would be up to $ 205bn, soaring 79% compared with the volume in the last five years. Insiders are expecting rising offshore plants price with ship owners’ increasing investment in the sector and the daily growing parts price. However, it is favorable to avoid overcapacity due to market swarm which happened to Chinese-built ATHS few years ago.
How to achieve sustainable industry development by planning from a global and overall perspective would be a tough task for Chinese shipbuilders in the future years.