Posted on 29 Jul 2022
For the first half of 2022, Chinese shipbuilders concluded new vessel orders totalling 22.46 million deadweight tons (DWT), down 41.3% on year, as against the 46% on-year decline in the first five months, according to the release from China Association of National Shipbuilding Industry (CANSI) via its official WeChat account on July 27.
As for June alone, Chinese yards secured new orders equivalent to 4.77 million DWT, higher by a whopping 107% on month, Mysteel Global noted from the CANSI data.
By end-June, the backlog of orders held by Chinese shipbuilders increased by 18.6% on year to reach 102.7 million DWT, or up 7.2% from that at the end of 2021, according to the association.
On the other hand, Chinese shipyards completed vessels totalling 18.5 million DWT in H1, down 11.6% on year. As for June, however, the tonnage grew further by 64.2% on month to settle at 4.22 million DWT – the highest in two years, indicating that "production had been gradually back to the normalcy," according to the release.
Over this year's first half, China's shipbuilding sector secured its top position in the global market, with its share of new orders won globally reaching 50.8%, and that for vessels completed at 45.2%, and its share of the global ship backlog orders at 47.8%, all in terms of DWT, the CANSI data showed.
CANSI noted that the enterprise concentration in Chinese shipbuilding sector remained stable, as the country's top 10 shipbuilders won 70.9%, 68.3% and 66.5% of completed vessels, new orders and order backlogs during H1 respectively.
Over January-June, China's 75 major shipbuilding enterprises under CANSI's tracking posted a 191.2% surge in their combined profits to Yuan 2.03 billion ($300.8 million), and their main business revenue gained 5.2% on year to Yuan 130.7 billion in total, the association noted.
"Despite the improvement in yards' profits, they are facing the pressure of higher comprehensive costs," CANSI said, noting that prices of marine equipment and ship paints generally moved up, and logistics costs increased sharply.
"In H2, with the rising risk of stagflation in the global economy and tightening policies of major economies, the uncertainty of external factors affecting the development of the shipbuilding industry will further increase," CANSI observed.
It added that "the international shipping market will remain active, and the transaction volume of new ships will stay high."
CANSI also estimated that Chinese shipbuilders' competed vessels may top 40 million DWT in 2022, their new vessel orders secured may reach about 50 million DWT, and for the backlog, it may stand at around 100 million DWT.
Source:Mysteel Global
