Main sea freight index at Baltic Exchange plunges to below 800 points

UNITED STATES February 02 2017 1:16 PM

LONDON (Scrap Register): The main sea freight index at Baltic Exchange for ships carrying dry bulk commodities plunged to below 800 points on Wednesday mainly due to a drop in cape, panamax and supramax indices.

The Baltic Dry Index, which provides an assessment of the price of moving the major raw materials – such as coal, iron ore and grain – by sea by taking in 23 shipping routes measured on a time charter basis, down further by 14 points to 786 points on Wednesday.

The Baltic Dry Index has plunged since the start of China’s Lunar New Year holiday as demand to ship raw materials into the world’s largest commodities consumer has dried up. 

The Baltic Dry Index declined 17% during January, its second consecutive month of declines, though Panamax rates notably bucked the trend rising on stronger grains trade. Despite the seasonal declines across other vessel classes, rates largely exceeded the more bearish expectations for the month.