WHAT happened on Wall Street a year ago this week has not for nothing been branded a ‘near death experience’ for capitalism. Indeed, for such household name institutions as Lehman Brothers, AIG and Merrill Lynch, it was a death experience, full stop.
While all that blood on the carpet for the investment bankers has inevitably translated into considerable pain for the shipping industry, so far we seem to have weathered the resultant global economic downturn well.
True, Maersk recently lost a cool half a billion bucks, while several of its peers have got the begging bowls out. Others in the sector, from KGs to shipyards, have undeniably suffered.
But instead of the spate of high profile collapses that might well have been expected, so far only Britannia Bulk and Eastwind have actually gone under.
With several leading economies now emerging from recession, the expectation for many business sectors is one of modest progress in the 12 months ahead.
Yet as ever, shipping remains a law unto itself, as evidenced from last week’s survey of industry sentiment produced by Norton Rose. The law firm is predicting that repossessions will increase over the winter, and insolvencies will follow in their course.
Few shipping concerns are of sufficient weight within national economies to merit the kind of treatment lavished on our banker friends, and operators will either survive or not in line with the dictates of the market.
Good luck with the coming period, readers. Some of you are going to need it.
