NOL APL ship

Singapore-based global shipping and logistics company NOL posted a net profit of US$3m in the second quarter of 2015, after a net loss of US$54m in the same period last year.

The US$1.238bn sale of its supply chain management business, APL Logistics, bumped its net profit to US$890m.

Despite freight rates across some of its major trade lines falling to their lowest levels in recent years and a 12 per cent volume reduction, NOL Group president and CEO Ng Yat Chung said that the group’s container shipping business, APL, reversed its US$15m loss in the second quarter of last year to a core EBIT profit of US$289m.

“The Group’s container shipping business continued to face a challenging environment characterised by over-capacity and weak market demand. Nonetheless, APL reversed a core EBIT loss in the second quarter last year to a positive position this year,” said Ng. “We remain focused on improving our cost competitiveness, yield optimisation and service reliability to return the liner business to sustained profitability.”