EXCLUSIVE: Ceva Logistics brings in outsider as new CEO
There’s news for you
AP Møller-Maersk has filed a court action against Brazil’s national port authority, Antaq, in protest against a policy that prevents its port operating unit, APM Terminals, from bidding for a concession in the country’s premier container gateway of Santos.
According to Reuters, the Danish complainant is seeking to overturn Brazilian competition rules which prevent existing operators in a port – APMT holds a 50% stake in Santos’ PTP facility, with the remaining 50% held by MSC’s port arm TiL – from entering first-round bids for new facilities.
The Tecon10 (STS10) terminal project has been on the drawing board since 2019 and, during the Bolsanaro presidency, was presented as part of plans for a full-scale privatisation of Santos, including its port authority.
While the return of left-wing Lula da Silva to power saw privatisation taken off the table, the administration has now decided to offer construction and operation of the STS10 project to private investors.
STS10 would see four new berths built in the Saboo area of Santos, boosting the port’s annual handling capacity by 3m teu.
According to the eeSea liner database, Santos’s current handling capacity across its four main container terminals is 6.4m teu. Last year, they handled just under 5.5m teu, representing a utilisation rate of 85%, a level most industry analysts regard as ‘fully utilised’.
Reuters also reported that TiL was considering submitting a similar case if the Maersk complaint is not upheld.
By extension, the world’s third-largest shipping line, France’s CMA CGM, would also be barred from bidding for STS10, after it recently acquired a majority stake in local operator Santos Brasil for around $1.1bn.
The completion of that purchase effectively ended local ownership in any of Santos’s container facilities – alongside CMA CGM, APMT and TiL, Emabraport is now 100%-controlled by DP World, while Libra Terminais was sold to Filipino terminal operator ICTSI for $195m in a distressed asset sale in 2019.
However, under Antaq rules, these operators may be invited to bid for the project in the second round, if eligible first-round bids are deemed invalid and “provided they divest their other holdings in the port complex”, Reuters reported.
The three European carriers have spent the past few years amassing a greater market share of Brazil’s container traffic: not only do they have a range of terminal investments across the country, but they also own Brazil’s three main cabotage operators, Maersk via Alianca, MSC’s Log-in Logistica, and CMA CGM through Mercosul.
The appetite for Brazilian shipping interests was further underlined earlier this month, when MSC acquired a 56% stake in local tug operator and logistics firm Wilson Sons for $768m, a price Loadstar Premium said represented a premium of around 66% on its pre-deal value.
Comment on this article