Neptune Orient Lines Ltd., Southeast Asia's largest container-shipping company, gained the most in almost two weeks in Singapore on optimism earnings will rise as it charges more to carry cargo to the U.S. Neptune Orient shares advanced as much as 4.8 percent to S$3.74. The company, a member of the shipping group Transpacific Stabilization Agreement, won approval to raise rates and impose surcharges on the Asia-U.S. route, Raymond Yap, an analyst at CIMB Securities Sdn., wrote in a report yesterday.
Higher prices on the company's biggest cargo route will help offset a 30 percent increase in the cost for bunker fuel in Singapore. The company, whose profit almost tripled in the last quarter, had said business this year will be challenging due to cost pressures.
Overall profitability should be better this year,'' Yap said in a note on the company today after an analysts' meeting yesterday. We believe the market has underestimated the strength of NOL's operating and financial performance.''
Neptune Orient and members of the Transpacific Stabilization Agreement had managed to impose a fuel levy for more than 90 percent of contracts negotiated between May 2008 and April next year, according to Yap. The liners have also boosted rates by an average of between $400 and $600 per forty- foot-equivalent box, he added.
The 10-member Westbound Transpacific Stabilization Agreement said yesterday it will step up efforts to recover higher costs by increasing fuel surcharges from July 1.
Neptune Orient said this week the average revenue per box climbed 13 percent to $2,940 in the four weeks to May 2, from the year before. It moved 203,000 forty-foot-equivalent units, 14 percent more than the year earlier.
The price of 380 Centistoke Bunker Fuel, used by ships, jumped to a record $644.50 a ton in Singapore on May 23, according to Bloomberg data.
Higher prices on the company's biggest cargo route will help offset a 30 percent increase in the cost for bunker fuel in Singapore. The company, whose profit almost tripled in the last quarter, had said business this year will be challenging due to cost pressures.
Overall profitability should be better this year,'' Yap said in a note on the company today after an analysts' meeting yesterday. We believe the market has underestimated the strength of NOL's operating and financial performance.''
Neptune Orient and members of the Transpacific Stabilization Agreement had managed to impose a fuel levy for more than 90 percent of contracts negotiated between May 2008 and April next year, according to Yap. The liners have also boosted rates by an average of between $400 and $600 per forty- foot-equivalent box, he added.
The 10-member Westbound Transpacific Stabilization Agreement said yesterday it will step up efforts to recover higher costs by increasing fuel surcharges from July 1.
Neptune Orient said this week the average revenue per box climbed 13 percent to $2,940 in the four weeks to May 2, from the year before. It moved 203,000 forty-foot-equivalent units, 14 percent more than the year earlier.
The price of 380 Centistoke Bunker Fuel, used by ships, jumped to a record $644.50 a ton in Singapore on May 23, according to Bloomberg data.