Supply Chain Research

The Taiwanese container-lines Evergreen Marine and Yang Ming experienced a slump in profits in 2Q 2018. Evergreen’s EBITDA margin fell to 0.3% from 10% a year earlier while Yang Ming made a 6% loss compared a 5% profit. Both blamed higher fuel costs (“unexpected” in Yang Ming’s case) repeating the pattern seen by Hapag-Lloyd, Maersk and others. Yang Ming hopes for improved volumes later in the year and has certainly been aggressive in building market share. Its U.S.-inbound volumes rose 16% in July vs. 13% in 2Q while Evergreen’s rose 9% vs. 3%. Both container-lines face risks from the T...