SIMIC

MAERSK is leading the way in laying-up surplus tonnage as demand remains weak on east-west tradelanes, reports London's Loadstar.
Yet Alphaliner reports the first decline this year in the idle boxship fleet, falling by 37 units, or 114,311 TEU, to 300 ships with a capacity of 1,565,624 TEU, representing six per cent of the global fleet.
"The sustained demand for tonnage has seen nearly all the NOO [non-operating containership owners] spot vessels finding new employment, with only three ships now available for charter globally, versus 20 at the beginning of February," said Alphaliner.
According to Alphaliner, Maersk tops the ocean carrier idle tonnage rankings, with 29 ships with a capacity of 281,400 TEU in lay-up, including 17 of more than 7,500 TEU.
Maersk is followed by its 2M partner, MSC, which has 13 vessels idled with a capacity of 119,000 TEU, of which seven are over 7,500 TEU.
MSC's idle tonnage includes the recently delivered largest containership in the world, the 24,346-TEU MSC Irina, which is being phased in to the 2M's AE10/Jade Asia-North Europe loop this week.
And while Maersk has opted to idle ships, including newbuilds, MSC has sought to redeploy more of its surplus tonnage to other routes or new services.