WORKING out the difference between good and bad times is a notoriously tricky call to make without the benefit of hindsight.

You don’t have to look too far through the pages of Lloyd’s List to find someone feeling the pinch of the credit crunch and market volatility. Postponed IPOs, elusive shipyard refund guarantees, even moves to raise additional capital are now able to unsettle nervous investors in a way that would have seemed unthinkable only months ago.

Then again it is heartening to note the calming words of DnB NOR’s new man, Harald Serck-Hanssen, who, in between the obligatory caveats and disclaimers, has rather sensibly reminded us that shipping is one of the industries that is actually doing rather well in today’s ‘bad’ climate.

We know that shipping companies, along with everyone else, will increasingly face tougher conditions for financing, but it is the start-ups that are more likely to struggle with raising funds than companies which have established relations with banks.

As times get tougher it is the well-run, well-disciplined and properly-governanced companies that will thrive. The question is whether anyone has really been tested to that extent yet? What makes a bad company bad? In the current climate, even bad companies have performed pretty well from a lenders’ perspective.

We have very short memories in this business, and someone who was bad and is now good may well very easily turn bad again.