A number of shipping companies reporting this week
11/16 Container shipping co (ZIM), Dry bulk shipper Star Bulk (SBLK), Dry bulk shipper Golden Ocean (GOGL)
11/14 SFL Corp (SFL) - mixed fleet of Container vessels, Dry bulk vessels, Tankers Car carriers, and a pair of drilling asset
11/15 LNG tanker operator Flex LNG (FLNG)
The only one I don’t own is SFL, so this was a busy week for me. In order of priority, ZIM was the result I was interested in. For two main reasons
- The collapse of the container shipping market in Q3 2022
- The impact if a shipper has more spot exposure (true of ZIM)
So how bad/good are things with ZIM?
ZIM revised their targets for 2022.
Adjusted EBITDA $7.4B - $7.7B (From $7.8B - $8.2B)
Adjusted EBIT $6.0B - $6.3B (From $6.3B - $6.7B)
Given that container spot rates plunged more than 70%, I would have expected ZIM to lower their adjusted numbers more than 5 -10%. So, for me, the news was less negative than what I was expecting (less negative is a positive, right?)
The other interesting item was the company plans to expand in the car carrier segment. If world economies are expecting a recession, surely the car sector would also be impacted, right? Already hearing stories of US consumers delaying high dollar purchase items - homes, cars. Don’t see why this would not also apply to other countries.