John Faraclas
Dry and Wet Markets in the red amid perplexed Geopolitics…
The BDI (Baltic Dry Index) lost eight points since yesterday and now stands at 1,855 points; on a weekly basis the losses were 69 points – from 1,924 (11/10). The Wets losses were substantial. As for the Geopolitics: couldn’t be worse and that’s the beginning of a Mega Geopolitical Mayhem governed by greed and apathy for the masses worldwide by the powerful nations which put Humanity and Liberty at stake still though ignoring that Nemesis’ savage will be monumental. John Faraclas’ daily and weekly recaps:
The Capes and Panamaxes were the biggest losers…
The BCI lost 17 points and now reads 3,064 points; the weekly loss was 126 points – down from 3,290 last week…
The BPI was down 17 to 1,840 and the weekly loss 76 down from 1,916…
Minor losses for the Supras and Handies; down two respectively with the BSI at 1,222 and minus one at 651. The weekly “finale” was plus four points for the BSI (from 1,218) and minus one for the BHSI (from 652)…
So, all in all a downwards and volatile market and we advise caution as the 2020 approaches and more hiccups will surface unless jeopardy rules the high seas… which will also affect the volatile Wets…
The Wets on a falling mode; the last published BDTI (Dirties) and BCTI (Cleans) stood at 1,432 – minus 100 and 937 – minus 35 points respectively… with the BCTI losing the 1,000 point threshold! The weekly Dirties were down 509! points from 1.941 and the Cleans were up 271 – from 666 last Friday the 11 October 2019…
The WTI was down to US$ 53.78 and on a weekly basis same was down 92 cents from last week’s US$ 54.70… Still high for the 7 (seven) billion people on Planet Ocean CAUTION!
The Geopolitics continue as perplexed as ever:
The MIGRANTS creating chaos particularly in the East Med / Aegean Sea with many being rescued whilst some even losing their lives. Some avoid the Greek Islands and go straight to the Greek mainland from all directions. The European Union is completely incapacitated to stop this and reprimand Erdogan’s Turks including the authorities to block them before boarding small boats and even self-made rafts… Some come from the land border and in small vans some of which had accidents injuring its “passengers” with the trafficker-drivers “disappearing”! SHAME This side reiterates the view that only a Naval Blockade with a Mandate and Rules of Engagement can stop this despicable and provocative Turkish blackmail; end of the story. Obviously NATO too can assist but so far nothing happens!!!!
The Turkish invasion and massacre of the Syrian Kurds looks like being halted although in some instances we have skirmishes… A very dubious “deal” there and wonder what next. In the USA Democrats and some Republicans question president Trumps decisions, policy, actions and meaningless words and expressions against the Kurds. A very heavy atmosphere in Washington. A very blur outcome in Syria. Too many issues at stake but above all the business interest in the EU and the USA as well as in other counties comes first and foremost beyond human lives. Mind Nemesis, this is our warning. You see all these factories selling arms to Turkey don’t give a damn for what takes place covered by the politician. What a shame eeeeeh!
BREXIT might, repeat might be decided tomorrow Saturday, the first Saturday session after 37 years!! Whatever happens it’s not the end. Many developments will follow whether all ends today or continues indefinitely as things saw.
The Hong Kong mess continues… Wonder how Beijing will finally react…
Catalonia still in yet another mess following the jail term of the separatists …
In Chile there is a possibility of revolts…
On another tone and note, the 2019 Tripartite in Tokyo with Shipowners – INTERCARGO, INTERTANKO, ICS, Class Societies and Shipyards, a very timely event – which must be widely repeated, ended in success, given the issues covered. Nearly 90 delegates including speakers attended!
Very important issues and many congratulations to those who construed an excellent agenda of issues to be aired and debated, as well as to the speakers and moderators.
Class Societies, Shipowners’ associations both for the dry and wets tonnage as well as shipyards and other associations and organisations had two days to address strategy and technical matters at Kaiun Club plus two social evenings at the Classic House at Akasaka Prince and Kaiun Club to network and see the best possible way out for many demanding aspects deriving from these main categories. As we are in a turning point both of technical advancement and environmental sensitivity this Tripartite event was more than welcomed by all of the Shipping industry’s stakeholders.
From the welcome / opening speeches panel
The Strategy Session yesterday had three welcoming speeches by reps from Class Societies, Shipowners and Shipyards – from both Europe (Sea Europe) and the Far East (ASEF) delivered by IACS chairman Arun Sharma, Intercargo’s Spyro Tarasis, ASEF’s Noriaki Usui and Sea Europe’s Benoit Loicq.
Then come the sub-session on GHG Strategy with six interesting papers; the panel was moderated by ICS Maurizio D’ Amico.
After the coffee break the “Digitalisation” sub session moderated by BIMCO’s Capt. Stefan Bulow with three interesting papers; these papers covered “Cyber Security, the autonomous and connected ships & shipping as well as an update on consolidation of cyber recommendations and other plan activities” and were delivered by BIMCO’s Lars Pedersen, Sea Europe’s Benoit Loicq and IACS George Reilly respectively..
The afternoon post lunch papers at sub session on the “Implementation of GHG strategy” was moderated by IACS’ Robert Ashdown; a very difficult subject but this difficulty was “alleviated” by four well construed papers delivered by ASEF’s Peng Guisheng on “Energy Efficiency/Wind Propulsion: Findings on the EEDI assessment framework for wind propulsion systems”; Sea Europe’s Sander Den Heijer on “Alternative Fuels/Technologies”; Intertanko’s Gil-Yong Han on “Performance Monitoring” and Bar technologies’ Simon Schofield on “Modern design simulation and optimisation techniques”.
Intercargo’s Spyros Tarasis made the recap of the strategy session before attendees went off for the official dinner.
The Pollution Prevention panel
Today’s events were all under the technical umbrella and the first sub session was on “Pollution Prevention” moderated by Intercargo’s Dimitris Monioudis. This sub session had four categories: Ballast Water, Sulphur Cap, Biofouling and Noise from Ships.
Speakers for the first included Intercargo’s Ed Wroe who delivered a paper on “EBP – results from Intercargo survey –an update from the last Tripartite”. Other papers come from Intertanko’s Efian Harun and Sea Europe’s / BEMA’s Mark Riggio and Andrew Marshall both on “EBP”. Sahan Abeysekara from IACS talked on the “Operational and Functional experience with BWMS”.
A view of the delegates during the Pollution Prevention session
The Sulphur Cap had two speakers, one from ASEF – Jeong hoon Kang who spoke on the “Scrubbers” and Cosmo Oil’s Mitsuyasu Kawaguchi whose paper was on “IMO 2020 & Bunker specifications: The big question surrounding blending for optimal results”.
Biofouling, a very important environmental issue, was covered by Intertanko’s (ASEF and BIMCO) Elfian Harun on “Minimising niche areas on new build designs”.
Finally, the “Noise from Ships” was covered by ICS’s Jonathan Spremulli.
After lunch the Design Safety sub session was moderated by IACS’s Rob Tustin with six speakers covering interesting issues starting from Containerships and ending with dry-docking control so to speak; IACS’s Satoshi Sasaki talked on “Containership fires / firefighting capabilities” – something that lately has cost lives and pollution too… on many instances…He also talked on “Fire Risks due to leakage from low-pressure fuel pipes”. Then come IUMI’s Lars Lange with “Containership fires”; he was followed by Buddy Reams from NACE who delivered a paper on “PSPC”!
Intercargo’s Ed Wroe spoke on “Conversions/Casualties – Lessons learnt/way forward” with Intertanko’s Dragos Rauta ending the sub session with a paper on “Standard Dry-docking checklist and Risk Assessment”.
Spyros Tarasis of Intercargo did also the closing / round up of this session alike the first day’s round up!.
As said in the preamble this Tripartite event must go global as repetitio est mater studiorum .
We hope to be able to obtain most of these interesting papers as well as a recap from the organisers. Well done!
Have a nicve evening and weekend but continue to remain on guard from actions emanating from Pirates, Terrorists, Criminals and Business Hooligans whatsoever wherever you are on Planet Ocean. It’s going to be a very interesting and unique weekend…
