WASHINGTON: COSCO SHIPPING Ports Ltd. reported profits attributable to equity holders of the company of $384.7 million for the first half of 2017, up 123.7 percent from the corresponding 2016 period, according to the company’s latest financial statements. Formerly known as COSCO Pacific, COSCO SHIPPING Ports is the port terminal operator arm of China COSCO Shipping Corp. Ltd., the merged shipping conglomerate formed last year from state-run firms COSCO and China Shipping. As of June 30, COSCO SHIPPING Ports had 3,314 employees.
COSCO SHIPPING Ports’ revenues for the first half of 2017 totaled $275.8 million, inching up 0.3 percent from the same period last year. Meanwhile, throughput at its container terminals for the first half of 2017 reached 41.8 million TEUs, surging 11.8 percent year-over-year. “The rise in international trade, the official operation of the OCEAN Alliance and ‘THE’ Alliance in April 2017, as well as the launch of mega-vessels, all increased calls at hub ports, and enabled the Group to achieve encouraging results in container terminals business,” COSCO SHIPPING Ports said. The throughput of the Greater China region accounted for 78.7 percent of COSCO SHIPPING Ports’ total container throughput for the first half of the year, with volumes totaling 32.9 million TEUs, up 6.1 percent from the first half of 2016.
Throughput at the Group’s overseas terminals, which accounted for the remaining 21.3 percent of its total container throughput for the first half of the year, stood at 8.9 million TEUs, rising 39.8 percent from the first half of 2016, mainly due to the inclusion of the volumes at Euromax Terminal Rotterdam B.V. to the Group since Oct. 1, 2016. During the first half of 2017, the group completed the subscription of non-circulating domestic shares in Qingdao Port International Co., Ltd. and the disposal of equity interests in Qingdao Qianwan Container Terminal Co., Ltd. Looking ahead, COSCO SHIPPING Ports expects its acquisition of a 51 percent stake in Noatum Port Holdings, S.L.U. in Spain to be completed within the second half of the year.
