Containerships

Who looks at maritime transportation? Feels underappreciated because the industry isn’t sexy and there’s no disrupting technology. On the flip side it’s not going to disappear anytime soon.

My take: obvious opportunities driven by macro trends. Historically low spot prices (per box or TEU/FEU if you’re familiar) driven by lackluster demand particularly on Asia/US trade lanes and overcapacity of ships stemming from an overfilled orderbook back in '13/'14.

Began seeing the more levered companies struggle to make payments on time starting late 2015. Korean carrier Hanjin filed for bankruptcy at the end of this past August. Expecting more to come as there’s no clear driver for prices. More consolidations/alliances will probably happen in 2017. Which is good for the survivors when prices do bounce back.

Structurally seeing startups trying to capture the inefficiencies of the system (complex legal issues, regulations, accounting systems, unions etc.) Point is to create a one stop shop so shippers don’t have to worry about their cargo.

P/e across roughly below 10yr average and can expect to go down more. Should present as a good chance to buy for a medium term 3-5yr horizon. Would make sure the carrier is well financed e.g. Maersk.

Thoughts?

You know more about the industry than I do, but my first thought was that Trump’s anti-global trade rhetoric has probably hit these stocks hard. A change in his stance would probably be beneficial.

Probably too early to tell on the impact of his policies because he’s a black box. Also hard to decipher how much is it will be realized. Anti trade will likely come through as raising tariffs which is bad for the containership business in terms of volume. Price-wise I would expect carriers to be able to transfer the burden to shippers via higher spot rates. It’s not like shippers can switch to air freight to ship bulky items.

Harsher punishment on trade violations is multifaceted. Bad for the industry in the short term but maybe good for the industry practice in the long run.

On the flip side, Trump’s $500b infrastructure plan will probably benefit the industry. But who knows when the first funding is going to kick in? Limiting corporate taxes will be a good boost.

Trump’s policies are inflationary. With tax cuts Fed will probably print more $$ causing dollar to weaken and benefiting American exports. Not sure if US carriers cover import or export more. But that’s an interesting thing to investigate.

Somewhat stoked with the Elaine Chao pick as transport secretary. Pluses on deregulation/pro-biz.

http://www.joc.com/regulation-policy/transportation-policy/us-transportation-policy/trump-transport-chief-pick-keen-rollback-regs-labor-power_20161129.html

I thought Trump would have bullish effects on USD. The inflationary environment will lead to higher interest rates followed by USD inflows, causing the currency to appreciate. Furthermore, policy uncertainty will cause investors to buy haven assets like USD at the expense of EM or other more risky currencies. The easiest way to support this is to observe that USD has already appreciated since Trump won the election.

Maersk is the only name in that sector that I’d even consider at this stage.

There’s a lot more to it than you’re getting and it’s not an “under appreciated industry.” Because of the depth of this cycle there are a lot of eyes on that space. I spent a lot of time looking at it and would add more, but probably won’t get to it this week, or possibly even next.

There might be an internship on a container ship shipping censors, which - I guess - would make it a censorship.

Shipping is definitely an industry that gets watched a lot, even though it isn’t technically a sexy industry. BS would be the first person on AF that I would ask about it.

id like to hear bros opinion

Greek shipping companies are mostly fraudulent despite the value you might see here

Aren’t there easier investment cases out there?