| The market environment for Panamax and post-Panamax bulk carriers remains challenging, and has been particularly affected over the past year by the slowdown in coal trades, said Italian broker Banchero Costa. Panamax bulkers are also increasingly challenged by large geared Supramaxes on some coal and grain trades where grabs or shallower drafts are preferred. Banchero Costa considers 65,000–119,999 dwt bulkers in the Panamax to post-Panamax range. The expansion of the Panama Canal has led to interest in post-Panamax and Kamsarmax bulkers where in the past such ships were limited to specialised ore or coal carriers. Banchero Costa noted that as evolving trades necessitated growing cargo capacity, ship designs increasingly pushed the limits within the boundaries of the beam restriction. An extremely popular design in recent years has been the Kamsarmax, originally developed by Japan’s Tsuneishi Shipbuilding and marketed as Tess82. Kamsarmaxes are tailored for Guinea’s port of Kamsar, a leading source of Bauxite cargoes. Kamsarmaxes have a Panamax beam with a larger-than-standard length of 229 m, giving a slightly larger than average size of 82,000 dwt or 83,000 dwt. While Kamsarmaxes rarely actually serve the port of Kamsar, which is a relatively niche trade, they immediately registered a great success on mainstream coal and iron ore business. Banchero Costa remarked, “In reality, Panamax and Kamsarmax ships rarely actually utilise the Panama Canal, US grain exports to Asia being the main exception, and the forthcoming expansion of the locks will soon make the beam distinction obsolete.” The Baltic Panamax index averaged just USD4,899 per day in the first two months of 2015, a fall of 57% year on year. No relief is expected due to the heavy orderbook. From January to February, IHS Maritime's Sea-web.com data showed 24 ships between 65,000–119,999 dwt, totalling 2 million dwt, were delivered. Half of the vessels delivered were between 80,000–84,999 dwt. |