The Baltic Exchange's main sea freight index,
which tracks rates to ship dry commodities, fell to its lowest by 2.85%in over
three years this time as sentiments were dragged down by surplus of vessels and
slow cargo trade.
The Baltic's capsize index fell by 0.99% with average daily
earnings sliding to $5,967, their lowest since last year and the estimation for capsizes operating costs were around $7,500 to $8,000 a day.
The overall index, which gauges the cost of shipping commodities
of iron ore have halved since the start of the year.
The Baltic's panamax index fell by 3.91 percent. Average daily
earnings for panamaxes, which usually transport 60,000 to 70,000 tonne cargoes
of coal reached $7,248.
Everyone is expecting things to turn around after the Chinese
Lunar New Year. There is a huge build-up of excess tonnage capacity because of
such a drop in activity and the market has also come down, said Nigel Prentis,
head of research, consulting and advisory with HSBC Shipping Services Ltd.
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