OOCL Q3 revenues drop 12.2% on Asia-Europe woes

The container line posted a 32 percent dive in Asia-Europe revenues in third quarter 2015, with revenues in the trade down more than 21 percent for the first nine months of the year.    Ocean carrier OOCL’s third quarter 2015 revenue plummeted 12.2 percent year-over-year to $1.3 billion, according to the company’s most recent financial statements.
   In an operational update, Hong Kong-based OOCL said the main culprit was the Asia-Europe trade, where third quarter revenue fell 32.2 percent, to $210.2 million, despite volume in that trade falling only 11.5 percent, to 222,872 TEUs. The Asia-Europe trade is OOCL’s third biggest, after the transpacific and intra-Asia and larger only than its transatlantic volume. But all four trades saw volumes decline in the quarter.
   In comparison, third quarter revenue in the transpacific fell 0.2 percent, to $518.1 million, on volume that rose 9.5 percent, to 365,162 TEUs.
   The carrier said its overall load factor was 7.1 percent lower than the same period in 2014, while average revenue per TEU decreased 13.8 percent compared to the third quarter of last year.
   Year-to-date, OOCL revenue is down 8.4 percent, to $4 billion, on volume that’s fallen 0.9 percent, to 4.2 million TEUs.