Hapag-Lloyd’s first half of 2018 net earnings have fallen by $66.65 million compared with 2017, despite revenue and volume increasing , as higher operational costs and geo-political uncertainties have taken a toll on the German ocean carrier.
Now the fifth largest liner as a result of COSCO’s OOIL takeover, Hapag-Lloyd’s earnings before interests, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rose by almost $70 million, compared with its first half 2017 results, to $518 million and its earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) in the same time period fell from $103.9 million to 101.62 million.
Revenues climbed to $6.18 billion and transport volume increased by 39%.
The results come after a challenging year for carrier .
Jorn Springer, of Hapag Lloyd, discusses how the carrier has developed this century in a Port Technology technical paper
In July 2018, the company saw its stock market value fall by $1.38 billion after it downgraded its profit forecast, something that prompted CEO Rolf Habben Jansen to announce cost-cutting measures.
It also strongly denied rumours it was in negotiations with French container shipping company CMA CGM over a merger.
Once the newly established Ocean Network Express carrier line has introduced its new build capacity into its global fleet, Hapag Lloyd will fall to the position of sixth largest ocean carrier.
Speaking about the results, Jansen said: “For the remainder of the year, we see a slow but steadily improving market environment, but we recognise that there are still significant geopolitical uncertainties that could influence the market.
“This only reinforces the necessity to be able to react quickly when needed – and we therefore will accelerate some of our digitalisation initiatives and finalise our new strategy until the end of this year.”
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