After a record profit, the Hamburg container shipping company Hapag-Lloyd expects a significantly lower surplus for the current year.

For 2023, CEO Rolf Habben Jansen is aiming for earnings before interest and taxes of two to four billion euros. In view of the ongoing war in Ukraine and other geopolitical conflicts as well as the effects of high inflation, however, this forecast is subject to considerable uncertainty, the company announced in Hamburg.

Sales rose sharply to 34.5 billion euros in 2022

Last year, the shipping company achieved the best financial year in its history with a profit of 17 billion euros. After the exceptional year 2021 caused by the corona virus, sales rose sharply again in 2022 to 34.5 billion euros. The reason for this is in particular the increased average freight rate from just under 1900 euros to almost 2700 euros per standard container (TEU) due to tight supply chains.

According to the information, the transport volume remained at the 2021 level at 11.8 million TEU, although transport expenses rose by 18.5 percent to 13.7 billion euros. After Hapag-Lloyd had already increased the dividend tenfold in 2021, it is now to be almost doubled again to EUR 63 per share. A total of 11.1 billion euros are to be distributed.

With a fleet of 251 container ships and a transport capacity of 1.8 million TEU, Hapag-Lloyd is the fifth largest shipping company in the world. The company with a good 14,000 employees in 135 countries calls at more than 600 ports on all continents with its 119 liner services.