The Baltic Exchange’s main dry bulk freight benchmark retreated on Monday as lower rates in the capesize and panamax markets weighed on the overall measure. Hellenic Shipping News — Dry Bulk, carrying a report credited to Investing.com, said the index finished at 2,628 points, its weakest reading in almost a week.
The composite lost 32 points, a decline reported as 1.23%. It tracks shipping rates across three vessel categories: capesize, panamax and supramax. The report identified declines in the first two segments as the drivers of Monday’s fall, but did not provide a separate supramax index reading or earnings figure.
Capesize rates came under pressure, with the segment’s index dropping 65 points, or 1.71%, to 3,726. That also put the capesize measure at a near one-week low. In both points and percentage terms, its reported fall was larger than the corresponding decline in the panamax index during the session.
Average daily earnings for capesize ships fell by $585 to $30,292, according to the report. These vessels generally transport iron ore and coal in cargoes of 150,000 tonnes. The earnings decline accompanied the weaker capesize index, while the source described iron ore prices themselves as moving within a narrow range on Monday.
In the iron ore market, participants were weighing two competing considerations centred on China, the largest consumer of the commodity. Expectations of seasonally softer Chinese demand were set against the possibility of further stimulus from Beijing to support the economy. The report presented those measures as a possibility rather than an announced policy change.
The panamax index, meanwhile, shed 34 points, or 1.61%, to close at 2,075. Unlike the roughly week-long lows recorded by the composite and capesize benchmarks, the panamax reading was its lowest since 30 July, according to Hellenic Shipping News.