China Shipping Container Lines Co aims to list in Shanghai before the end of 2007 to buy container assets from its state parent and fund a 44-percent fleet expansion by early 2012, a senior executive said.
Known as CSCL, the world's No. 6 container ship operator had planned to issue up to a fifth of its enlarged share capital, worth US $1.4 billion based on current prices. Executive Director Huang Xiaowen said on October 15 the firm's listing of A shares in Shanghai was on track to finish before the end of this year.
Shares of CSCL rose 8 percent to a record in the morning after it reported last week a 30 percent rise in third-quarter revenue to 11.04 billion yuan ($1.47 billion). About two-thirds of the money raised from the new shares will go towards buying ships to lift capacity to over 630,000 20-foot-equivalent units (TEU) in 2012 from 437,000 TEU at the end of September, Huang told Reuters.
"We ordered eight 13,300 TEU container vessels from South Korea's Samsung Heavy, with the first to be delivered in 2010," Huang said in a telephone interview. The 13,300 TEU-vessel is the largest in the world. Ship operators are looking for bigger and bigger ships to serve booming trade and save costs.