N​ew Shipping Alliance Begins Operation in April​

The executives of COSCO Shipping ports and CMA CGM Terminals Holding signed a Memorandum of Understanding in order to improve and strengthen the partnership of the Ocean Alliance. It's going to be the biggest world's alliance with COSCO, CMA CGM, Evergreen, and OOCL as members. In total it has 350 vessels with capacity of 3.5 million TEU calling around the world. It's services include 20 transpacific routes, 6 Asia - North Europe laps, 3 transatlantic loops, 5 Asia-Middle East and two Asia-Red Sea services, as an addition there are also 5 Asia - Mediterranean routes. 
The alliance will operate in 30 ports all over the world. The competitors of the Ocean Alliance are 2M Alliance (Maersk and MSC) and THE Alliance (Hapag-Lloyd, K Line, MOL, NYK and Yang Ming)

Angola´s First Deep Sea Port

The Fundo Soberano de Angola (FSDEA), sovereign wealth fund, will invest 180 million USD for the first strategic deep sea port in Cabinda. 

630 m length terminal will be built over there and connected to the shore with a 2 km long bridge. The access channel will be 15 m deep and the port will have 14 m of water depth. 
As per FSDEA, the new facility will provide a free trade zone, state-of-the-art ship repair, storage and unloading.

The US Court finally approved Hanjin's 54% port stake sale. Currently it operates in TTI (Total Terminals International) Seattle and Long Beach port Terminals. The rest 46% already belongs to Swiss Mediterranean Shipping Company, so the Hanjins stake is going to be sold to its affiliate - Terminal Investment Limited (TIL). The sale was approved by the Seoul Central District Court in December and then by the US Bankruptcy Court. 

Hanjin owned stake is USD 78 million ​381-acre Pier T container terminal - the largest terminal of the port. The Long Beach Board of Harbor Commissioners gave a nod to MSC to take it under long-term lease.

Eight Newbuildings for Scorpio Tankers

Monaco-based Scorpio Tankers will take out a loan of up to USD 172 million in order to finance roughly 60% of the market value of eight tankers currently being bulit at Hyundai Mipo Dockyard in South Korea.

The tankers are scheduled for delivery in 2017 and early 2018.

The loan facility is composed of multiple tranches with maturity dates set between six and twelve years.

Scorpio Tankers owns 77 product tankers and charters additional sixteen.

A total of 10 new tankers is under construction and should be delivered to the shipper over the next two years.

Port of Hong Kong reports container volume decrease 

As per recent records, annual container volume has fallen to under 20 mln TEU for the first time in a last decade. In 2016, Hong Kong port took care of 19.58 mln TEU and showed the best year result in December, 2016, handling 1.8 mln TEU. Despite these numbers, port produced 2.5% less of container volumes than in 2015. Its main terminal - Kwai Tsing - made 1,4 mln TEU in a year which is more than 12,7% more than the last year while other terminals saw overall reduction in 2016.