Container ship newbuilding enquiries roll on despite end of bull run

Shipbuilders are fielding enquiries for more than 60 container ship newbuildings despite falls in charter rates, but owners’ and operators’ fuelling choices are diversifying.

Newbuilding sources named at least six big-name shipowners and liner companies — CMA CGM, Evergreen Marine, Yang Ming Marine Transport and HMM, as well as tonnage providers MPC Container Ships and Seaspan Corp — as being in talks with yards for boxships varying in size between feeder vessels of 2,000 teu and neo-panamaxes of 15,000 teu.