Platts launches weighted average Supramax TCE indices

S&P Global Platts has started publishing new daily weighted average Supramax time charter equivalent, or TCE, indices reflecting Asia Pacific trade, basis 0.5% sulfur bunker fuel and scrubber-fitted ships, and comprising ton-mile rates of five key TCE assessments, from Feb. 1, 2021. The new indices are called APSI 5 and APSI 5S.

The APSI 5 index is a demand-weighted average of five key TCE assessments basis 0.5% sulfur bunker fuel, while APSI 5S is an average of the same TCE assessments basis scrubber-fitted ships.

Platts first proposed launching the new indices in a subscriber note published Dec. 10, 2020: http://plts.co/WsZD50CZ2Vo.

These new indices reflect an important part of the global dry bulk market that is otherwise not reflected in existing price benchmarks. Supramax vessels in Asia Pacific typically remain within the region and the associated flows depend significantly on triangulation, which helps to minimize ballast time as well as boost tonnage utilization and earnings.

The new indices reflect this important vessel flow that includes the movement of wide-ranging commodities such as coal, nickel ore, limestone, dolomite, gypsum, aggregates, fertilizers, met-coke, bauxite, spodumene, iron ore, bauxite, manganese, grains and sugar.

At the same time, Platts has started publishing Supramax voyage and TCE assessments for the Newcastle, east coast of Australia to Campha, Vietnam route from Feb. 1, 2021 to reflect the increasing liquidity on this thermal coal route (http://plts.co/8OUS30ruZPT).

The APSI 5 and APSI 5S index assessments for the 57,000 dwt Supramax class vessel are derived by applying an allocated weighting to the daily Supramax TCE assessments of five key round voyages published at the 5:30 pm Singapore close (0930 GMT). The index assessments follow the Platts Singapore publishing schedule.

Weighting for the individual TCE assessments is determined by the volume of Supramax vessel movements observed between the regions associated with the respective voyages in the last three years from Platts trade-flow software cFlow, calculated in ton-miles. Ton-mile demand is calculated by multiplying the volume of cargo moved in metric tons by distance traveled in miles.

The weighting for the average TCE assessments would be as follows, based on flows observed over Jan. 1, 2017, to Dec. 31, 2019:

Basis bunker fuel 0.5%:

Basis scrubber fitted:

The APSI 5 and APSI 5S TCE indices appear in Platts Dry Freight Wire and on Shipping Alert pages SHP 612, SHP 613, SHP 614, SHP 615 and Platts Global Alert pages PGA 3970, PGA 3971, PGA 3972, PGA 3973 under the following price database codes:

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