Heiko Hoffmann: Mr Habben Jansen, how do you view the 2022 financial year?

Rolf Habben Jansen: The first half of the year continued to be shaped by disruptions in the global supply chains. The main reasons behind this were capacity bottlenecks in the ports and on the landside. Beginning in the second half of the year, there were clear signs of easing in the global supply chains, which can mainly be attributed to the weakening economy. Owing to lower demand for container transports, what had initially been very high freight rates gradually declined. At the same time, congestion dissipated in many trade lanes. Despite this deteriorating market environment, we have kept our transport volume in 2022 at the prior-year level – also thanks to our diversified network and stable customer base. This enabled us to achieve exceptionally strong overall results – which is certainly a very special gift in the year of our 175^th anniversary.

Due to congestion in ports, we were forced once again to contend with significant delays. As a result, we unfortunately weren’t always able to deliver the schedule reliability that we aspire to as a quality provider. However, we have left no stone unturned to offer our customers the best service possible. That is why we have made numerous network and route adjustments, purchased used vessels and taken delivery of new units, invested in human and IT resources, and further expanded the range of our digital offerings to customers. I would like to express my profound appreciation to our teams on land and at sea, who have once again done a fantastic job under these difficult conditions.

Russia’s war in Ukraine is a humanitarian catastrophe and is causing extraordinary suffering for a lot of people. Several things were clear to us: first, that the safety and well-being of our employees was our top priority, which is why we have closed our office in Odessa for the time being and offered our colleagues the alternative to work at other Hapag-Lloyd locations; and, second, that we are very closely connected with Ukraine and its people and will live up to our social responsibility. For example, in keeping with our corporate value “We Care”, we have supported more than 30 aid activities aimed at helping people in Ukraine or people who have fled the war. On the other hand, we have been able to cope with the purely operational and economic impacts of the war. Historically, our business connected with Russia or Ukraine has only amounted to between 1 and 2 percent of our total volume.

We have continued to pick up speed with our Strategy 2023, such as by further optimising our business processes and operations, strengthening our lines of business, and making targeted investments. In addition to our acquisition of the container liner business of Deutsche Afrika-Linien, other major focuses of the year under review were investments in terminals and infrastructure. For example, we have bolstered our business in Europe by acquiring a 49 percent stake in the Italy-based Spinelli Group. Through the planned acquisition of the terminal business of the South America-based SM SAAM, we will further expand our portfolio in Latin America. Thanks to our investment in J M Baxi Ports & Logistics at the beginning of the current year, we will also be participating even more strongly in the dynamic growth in India. We have also started to equip our entire container fleet with Track & Trace devices. By enabling our customers and ourselves to track container movements in real time, we will be making supply chains even more transparent and efficient. On top of that, we are now offering our customers more than 20 digital products that make it convenient for them to do business with us. And we are also making progress when it comes to decarbonisation. In addition to using biofuels, we launched an extensive Fleet Optimisation Programme last year. This will enable us to significantly reduce the fuel consumption and CO₂ emissions of 150 ships – such as by outfitting them with more efficient propellers, flow-optimised bulbous bows or improved hull paints that minimise frictional resistance.

Heiko Hoffmann, Head of Investor Relations

Thanks to high freight rates, we achieved an exceptionally strong Group net result of EUR 17 billion in the 2022 financial year. As a result, our equity has grown to EUR 28 billion, and our equity ratio has risen to over 70%. For this reason, our Executive Board and our Supervisory Board will jointly propose to the Annual General Meeting to pay out EUR 63 per share to our shareholders – which corresponds to a total of EUR 11.1 billion.

The economic slowdown has completely transformed the market conditions in container shipping within just a few months. In some trade lanes, we are currently seeing freight rates at levels where they were before the outbreak of COVID-19, while our costs have risen significantly due to supply chain disruptions and inflation-related factors. So we will continue to act flexibly and keep a close eye on our per-unit costs. However, a significant decline in earnings in the current financial year will be unavoidable. We expect our EBIT to be in the range of EUR 2 billion to EUR 4 billion, after we were able to achieve an EBIT of EUR 17.5 billion in the exceptional 2022 financial year. Irrespective of this, quality and sustainability will continue to play a significant role for us. What’s more, we will also be working very intensively this year to formulate the strategic course that we will pursue until 2030. In doing so, we will keep the interests of our shareholders and customers – as well as of our employees – firmly in mind. I would like to express my sincere thanks to all of them for their intense cooperation and trust during this extraordinary financial year.