Despite talks and expectations by shippers and carriers of an uptick in activity and demand in the MPP sector, figures keep painting a different story. Toepfer Transport Multipurpose Index keeps heading down with analysts still left scratching their heads. 

The Hamburg-based shipbroker showed in its latest monthly review that the index dropped to $12,572 per day for the month of October 2023. Compared to the previous month, when the index was at $12,958 per day, this was a 2.98 per cent drop.

Compared to October 2022, Toepfer Transport’s TMI slid down 38 per cent. It has to be acknowledged that the charter rates at the time were starting to drop from their all-time highs.

Looking six months ahead, Toepfer Transport expects the index rates to edge up 0.85 per cent while this time next year the TMI is expected to be 5.78 per cent higher.

“The last quarter of the year will be crucial to provide shipowners with optimism and security as only a sustainable, adequate income will allow them to take necessary measures and investments for the forthcoming challenges around global and regional regulations to meet climate targets,” Toepfer’s analysts said in a quarterly report.

Commenting on the latest figures, Teopfer Transport’s analysts said, “The decline of the index rate is slowing down, while there is no significant change of the market conditions compared to last month. The TMI-P12 indicates that the sentiment of the market stakeholders is still positive for 2024 and onwards.”

“The sale and purchase S&P market activity is still low, and there is no major progress to report with regard to the ongoing negotiations of some owners at Chinese and other Asian shipyards. There are quite some interesting newbuilding designs in the making,” according to Toepfer Transport.

Newbuilding prices for 9,000 dwt, 12,500 dwt and 30,000 dwt newbuilds, according to Toepfer Transport, were at $20, $30.5 and $51 million, without any change from the previous month. Prices on the second-hand market also remained unchanged at $11, 15.25 and $19 million for 9,000 dwt, 12,500 dwt and 30,000 dwt vessels, respectively.