Evergreen said to be moving to mega ships despite its overcapacity fear

EVERGREEN will break its self-imposed pledge against chartering ships bigger than 8,000 TEU by agreeing to a deal for 10 more newbuilds of 13,000 TEU from the Niki Group of Greece, reports TradeWinds.

Niki is ordering up to 11 vessels, said to be of around 13,000 TEU and costing close to US$170 million each, at South Korea's STX Shipbuilding for long-term charter to Evergreen. But other sources told TradeWinds that the order could be split between STX and Hyundai Heavy Industries.

The ships are believed to be similar to the nine 12,600-TEU vessels ordered a few months ago for $1.4 billion by Niki at the STX yard for a bareboat charter to MSC at $50,500 a day.

The big ships, reportedly bound for Evergreen service, are scheduled for delivery from 2011, the same year as MSC's, said TradeWinds.

All of which goes against Evergreen group chairman Chang Yung Fa's statement that he stands against using mega ships because of losses if they are not full. He admitted to widespread disagreement in his company on the point.

Some evidence of this disagreement surfaced at last month's World Shipping Summit (China) 2007 when Evergreen Marine chairman Arnold Wang expressed confidence in future growth, saying that barring unexpected disasters, the container market would flourish in the years ahead with China's economic boom continuing to drive growth.