China test Cosco liftings keep on rising-Trade

BOX line and terminal operator China Cosco Holdings reported a continued increase in liftings, revenue and throughput yesterday for the third quarter to September 30.

The Hong Kong-listed company controls the operations of Cosco Container Lines and terminal operator Cosco Pacific.

The firm said Coscon posted a 7.6% rise in revenue to Yuan9.2bn ($1.16bn) in the third quarter following a 16.4% rise in liftings to 1.38m teu.

This compared with revenue of Yuan8.56bn on liftings of 1.18m teu in the same period last year.

The biggest gain in revenue was on China routes, where revenue rose 24.9% to Yuan451.2m on the back of a 24.6% rise in box volumes to 230,655 teu.

On other international routes, the largest increase in revenue was on Asia-Europe services which also included the Mediterranean, where turnover rose 14.5% to Yuan2.87bn, up from Yuan2.51bn in the third quarter last year.

Liftings on this sector surged 25.6% to 336,048 teu, against 267,504 teu a year earlier.

Intra-Asia services saw an 8.2% rise in revenue to Yuan1.57bn, up from almost Yuan1.46bn last year, following a 17.4% increase in liftings to 408,603 teu, against 348,116 teu previously.

However, the trans-pacific remained Coscon''''s largest trade route, with revenue edging up by 4.6% to Yuan3.69bn between July and September, up from Yuan3.53bn a year ago.

Container volumes were marginally higher, rising by 5.4% to 338,433 teu, up from 321,053 teu.

But reflecting the increased competition on the transatlantic trade, revenue from these and minor services crashed 16.4% to Yuan568.89m, down from Yuan680.57m.

This was despite a 3.8% increase in liftings to 65,350 teu.

China Cosco''''s terminals company, Cosco Pacific, saw an overall 28.9% rise in container volumes to 8.88m teu in the third quarter.

The company, which has stakes in 16 terminals in China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Belgium, said the biggest increase was at Dalian Port Container Terminal where volumes soared 72.8% to 104,900 teu.

Cosco Pacific''''s flagship terminals at Yantian saw a 17% rise in throughput to almost 2.42m teu in the third quarter.

But volumes at Cosco-HIT in Hong Kong continued to drop, falling by 10.8% in the third quarter to 431,600 teu.

In Singapore, Cosco Pacific saw a 0.3% decline in volumes at Cosco-PSA Terminals to 157,100 teu.

Belgium''''s Antwerp Gateway terminal, which started contributing to Cosco Pacific in September last year, handled 173,600 teu in the third quarter against 6,500 teu in the same period last year.

In the first nine months of this year, Cosco Pacific reported a 25.6% rise in box volumes to 23.88m teu, up from 19.02m teu a year earlier.