baltic dry index

[craig12]

anyone got any views on this statitistic i think its a measure of the goods in the whole world sold or exported

it sits at a record low today  not seen since the eighties

i think its currently at 569   when the 2008 crash came it was at  724  and it was higher when lehman brothers went

[garthy]

I don't know much about the Baltic dry index, what I do know is that everywhere within the world's economy there's record highs and record lows, things definitely aren't as rosey as they make out, they really have messed things up.

[motorbikez]

When I was heavily investing in shares the BDI  was one of the indexes I found particularly interesting. It is something no government can fiddle & Garthy is absolutely correct things are no where near as rosy as the financial pundits and governments make out.

[BaldyBob]

Lowest in 29 years apparently, and I don't disagree with the general financial view.

 

All I would add is that figures can be skewed by the number of ships available.

 

A lot of new builds were ordered to feed the Chinese demand for bulk commodities. A lot of these have been delivered in the last few years, but the cargo is not there anymore. Additionally these ships tend to be a bit on the large side.

 

From my point of view, it is a good thing as when times get hard a lot of the older tonnage finds it hard to make a profit and is sent to scrap. As ship availability declines, demand will increase again.

The last big slump in the early 80's saw a few of the old British names go to the wall.