The German containerized line Hapag-Lloyd registered an increase of more than 80% in operating profits: earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) for the fiscal year 2019 amid better freight rates and cost management efforts, says WMN.
The company’s EBIT was 811 million euros (876 million dollars) compared to an EBIT of 444 million euros reported in 2018. Furthermore, earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) increased to EUR 1,986 million from EUR 1,139 million published the previous year. consequently, Hapag-Lloyd’s revenue for the year increased by 9 percent, reaching EUR 12.6 billion.
The company attributed the increase to an improved average loading rate of $ 1,072 / TEU for the entire year, which increased 2.6 percent year-on-year (2018: $ 1,044 / TEU) as the company focused more on more routes profitable commercial and active revenue management.
In addition, the company said a year-on-year increase of 1.4 percent in transport volumes, to more than 12 million TEU (2018: 11.9 million TEU), and a stronger exchange rate for the US dollar VS the Euro also contributed positively to the operating earnings.
The lower container handling and land transport costs, as well as a slightly lower average bunker consumption price of USD 416 per ton (2018: USD 421 per ton), had a positive effect on transport costs, which increased to a total of EUR 9.7 billion (2018: 9.6 billion euros), also affected by a stronger US dollar.
However, the panorama for this year with the commercial war between the USA and China, the CORONAVIRUS, the change of bunker used by the IMO 2020 regulation and all the effects that emerge from each of these events clouds the panorama of the current year Fiscal for containerized lines. Its strong presence in secondary services serving South America could alleviate the tensions of other traffic.
