Introduction to Shipping Markets

Abstract

The shipping industry has been developed to facilitate international trade through connecting sources of supply and demand for commodities including raw materials, manufactured goods, and finished products, as well as transportation of passengers, cars and even livestock, between ports and countries. The growth in seaborne trade in the last century has led to the expansion of the shipping industry and its related businesses and markets such as shipbuilding, ship-broking, insurance, together with shipping finance and investment. In addition, the growth in international trade has also been the reason behind the design of larger and more specialised ships to carry specific commodities in order to achieve economies of scale in sea transportation. Furthermore, the shipping market has been shaped and structured in such a way as to accommodate the needs of charterers by defining different types of contracts varying in their duration, method of payment and cost allocations.KeywordsSpot RateSpot MarketFreight RateVery Large Crude CarrierShipping MarketThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.