Drewry says price of new containers falls to record lows in 2015

The London-based shipping research and consulting firm said it forecasts slow growth in the world container fleet of four to five percent per year through 2019.

   The price of new containers fell to record lows in 2015 and is forecast to fall further in 2016, according to the London-based shipping and consulting firm Drewry.
   The firm, which has recently published its annual container census, said the decline was due to cheaper production and material costs as well as weaker demand.
   Container prices fluctuated during the year, but Drewry said the average price of a 20 foot container in 2015 totaled $1,750, down 15 percent from the average price in 2014. At the end of 2015, the price of a standard 20-foot container stood at $1,450, close to the all-time low of 2001-2002, and down from $1,900 a year earlier.
   “Some of the recent price fall has resulted from the weakening state of the global economy and the decline in trade demand,” said Drewry’s lead analyst for container equipment Andrew Foxcroft. “Drewry is forecasting a further possible fall in the overall price for 2016, as it dipped briefly to $1,300 by the second quarter.”
   The global container equipment fleet amounted to 37.6 million TEU at the end of 2015, having increased in size by 3.8 percent, or 1.36 million TEU during 2015.
Foxcroft said the numbers of 40-foot high cube (dry and reefer) containers grew at a faster rate, 6.4 percent compared with 3 percent for the 20-foot containers.
   The increase in 2015 “was lower than at any time previously, apart from 2009 when the box fleet actually shrank, and was prompted by the weakening state of the global economy and a further decline in trade demand,” said Drewry.
   In the coming years, Drewry forecasts the world’s container fleet will slowly expand, with a maximum of annual growth between 4 percent and 5 percent in 2016-19.
   “The weaker growth in 2015, which has affected the global container fleet as a whole, was also accompanied by a significantly poorer showing by the box lease industry. This – as opposed to the shipping line sector – was to suffer more from the downturn in demand, as indicated by its proportionally lower rate of fleet expansion,” Drewry said.