Ship Owners Are a Bullish Lot –Deloitte & Touche/Marine Money Survey

By Prasanth Prasannakumar and Jim Lawrence

The legendary investor Warren Buffett has said, “In a commodity type business you’re only as smart as your dumbest competitor”. The overwhelmingly upbeat tone of the respondents to the first Deloitte & Touche/ Marine Money survey defies the commodity – like nature of the maritime transportation business. This may well be evidence that trends in shipping may be precursors of things to come, leading indicators of what the future holds for the economy, or simply that shipowners are an optimistic lot.

Approximately two-thirds of the executives surveyed felt that the business outlook for their firm over the next year was positive, and more than half expected their fleet to grow. This is nothing short of astounding, especially given the year that we are just coming off. The bloodbath in the stock markets, terrorism threats, oil shocks, wars, political unrest all contributed to a generally subdued mood in the rest of the economy. Shipping has once again proven to be counter-cyclical.

The enthusiasm cut across all size companies, with 60% of those with annual revenues of less than $50 million expecting fleet growth, 57% of those whose company revenues are between $50 million and $100 million and 50% of those whose annual revenues are over $100 million expecting growth as well.

This is only an excerpt of Ship Owners Are a Bullish Lot –Deloitte & Touche/Marine Money Survey

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