Capesize freight rates inched up after a slow start of the week, despite improvement seen in both basins.
The Capesize 5 time charter average, then rose up by $279 day-on-day to $33,348 on Monday, despite limited fixtures done in the physical market.
The Baltic Dry Index (BDI) also hiked up by 2.12% day-on-day, up 69 points to 3,324 readings, due to better freight rates.
Better shipping demand in the Pacific
The Pacific market continued to enjoy heathy shipping demand with fresh enquiries for moving Russian and Indonesian coal cargoes.
Moreover, there was also shipping demand from South Korean steel mills to ship raw materials in the basin.
Though, there was some concerns over lower steel demand in China due to rainy season and political celebration in early July that resulted in suspension of some Chinese steel mills to improve air quality.
On the contrary, the Atlantic market moved slowly with some ongoing market negotiation to fix vessels on the Key Brazil to China route.
Most of these were date specific, while there was also some healthy demand for iron ore and coal shipping from South Africa.
Bunker prices benefit from strong crude market
The bunker prices rose further on improved crude market, as the price of VLSFO went up by $3/mt on-day to $549/mt in the port of Singapore.
The recent uptick of bunker prices followed the firm crude prices due to market optimism over recovering demand from the pandemic.
However, the overall bunker demand remained low during the pandemic period, as bunker demand of the 17 leading bunkering areas saw a yearly drop of 11.9% by Mar 31, according to Blue Insight survey.
However, the big bunker firms stood to benefit from the declining bunker demand trend, while smaller bunker firms struggled to stay afloat.