Hapag-Lloyd: Q1 “pretty good” – but 2025 trends “pretty uncertain”

Hapag-Lloyd recorded a positive Q1/2025 with strong revenue and profit growth, but warned of a dim outlook for the full year due to global volatility and uncertainty in the US-China trade war.

Hapag-Lloyd-container-vessel

Hapag-Lloyd container ship (Photo: BreakbulkNews/Phaata)

Hapag-Lloyd warned in its Q1 business results announcement today that any cargo growth following the US and China’s temporary suspension of trade tariffs is likely to be short-lived.

The German shipping line recorded a 15% increase in consolidated revenue in Q1 compared to the same period last year to $5.3 billion; EBITDA increased 17% to $1.1 billion and EBIT increased 45% to $500 million.

As mentioned earlier, Hapag-Lloyd's shipping volume increased by 9% year-on-year to 3.3 million TEUs – double the market growth of 4.2% according to Container Trade Statistics (CTS). The average freight rate across all routes also increased by 9% to USD 1,480/TEU.

However, compared to Q4/2024, the average freight rate decreased by 5%. Meanwhile, the cost per TEU in Q1/2025 was USD 1,315.

Analysts are particularly interested in recent developments on the trans-Pacific shipping route, which has been heavily disrupted in recent weeks.

“On the back of the preliminary tariff agreement that was closed over the weekend, we saw a surge in volume over the last couple of days,” said Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd. “Bookings this week are 50%-plus, compared with last week, because tariffs are down, but also because some cargo was buffered in China, and that now needs to move.”

“Whether this is going to be a surge that’s going to take 60 or 90 days, or whether that’s going to last longer, I think it’s very difficult to predict at this point, but we don’t expect it to hold. It will also depend on the further talks between China and the US.”

In terms of trade lanes, the trans-Pacific remains the carrier’s largest market, with 947,000 TEUs transported in the quarter, followed by Asia-Europe at 939,000 TEUs. The transatlantic trade reached 685,000 TEU, while the trades to Africa and the rest of the world totalled 788,000 TEU.

The first quarter also saw the official launch of the Gemini Cooperation alliance between Hapag-Lloyd and Maersk, which Habben Jansen said “has gone really, really well”.

“We’re starting to see more and more proof points that this is really working: 95% of the ships are into the network; all the services are up and running and we’ve had well over three thousand port calls since 1 February; and reliability is still around 90%,” he said.

“If we compare it with our competition, there is a very clear gap.”

In the terminal business, subsidiary Global Hanseatic Terminals also completed the acquisition of a 60% stake in the CNMP terminal in Le Havre in early March, with stable revenue and EBIT of USD 109 million and USD 15 million, respectively.

Despite the significant uncertainties in global demand, Hapag-Lloyd maintained its 2025 forecasts with consolidated EBITDA ranging from USD 2.5 billion to USD 4 billion, and EBIT ranging from zero to USD 1.5 billion.
“The trend for 2025 at the moment is pretty uncertain,” Habben Jansen emphasized.

“We see new developments every day – the only thing we know for sure is that the first quarter was pretty good. We now expect to see a little bit of a surge in volume in the upcoming 60 or 90 days.”

“Beyond that, it’s very difficult to predict and will depend very much on what kind of agreements will be closed between the US and other countries, but also between other countries bilaterally, as we have seen between Brazil and China, and also Mercosul and European Union,” he added.

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