EBITDA climbs but group profit falls, with the impact of geopolitical uncertainty set to continue in 2025
Shipping group Hapag-Lloyd has published its 2024 annual report and announced its outlook for the current financial year.
According to the report, a slight increase in operating result was achieved in 2024.
EBITDA rose to US$5bn, while EBIT improved slightly compared to the prior year, up to US$2.8bn.
At US$2.6bn, Hapag-Lloyd’s profit was below that of the prior year, particularly owing to lower interest income and higher tax expenses, it said.
“In a challenging market environment, we achieved solid results and further increased customer satisfaction,” said Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd.
”We have further consolidated and expanded our terminal business under the Hanseatic Global Terminals brand,” he continued. ”We have worked hard to further improve processes which will yield results in the years to come and stepped up our investments in digitalisation and training of our people.
”Finally, we launched the largest newbuild programme in our company’s history, which will enable us to further modernise and decarbonise our fleet.”
In the Liner Shipping segment, transport volumes for 2024 as a whole rose by 4.7 per cent, to 12.5mn TEU – up from 11.9mn TEU in 2023 – and revenues increased to US$20.3bn.
Despite higher transport expenses in connection with the necessary rerouting of ships around the Cape of Good Hope, the segment’s EBITDA increased to US$4.9bn while EBIT remained at the prior-year level of US$2.7bn.
The terminal and infrastructure segment recorded an improvement in its EBITDA to US$151mn.
For the 2025 financial year, the executive board said it expected group EBITDA to be in the range of US$2.5bn to US$4bn, an outlook that remained subject to ”considerable uncertainty due to the highly volatile development of freight rates and major geopolitical challenges”.
“In 2025 we are off to a very good start with Gemini, but the economic and geopolitical environment remains fragile,” confirmed Habben Jansen.
”In this context, we anticipate earnings in 2025 to be lower than in 2024.
”In the first half of the current year, we will implement our Gemini network and expect to set new standards in terms of schedule reliability,” he outlined.
”We will continue to develop Hanseatic Global Terminals and await to further grow our inland business.
”At the same time, we will keep a very close eye on our unit costs and focus on becoming even more efficient and climate-friendly,” Habben Jansen added.
