The first merger of major container lines since the economic crash in 2008 has now been confirmed between Chile’s CSAV and Germany’s Hapag-Lloyd. It will inevitably get pundits talking about whether more carrier combinations are on the way — not least because some of the top personalities involved want to find a third partner.
But despite the obvious synergies between the two carriers, whose networks generally speaking complement each other — CSAV in the north-south trades and Hapag-Lloyd in the east-west trades — is there really a good case for container lines to get married?
It is arguable that all the evidence points to “no” and that the next plan for the combined Hapag-CSAV — to float on a stock exchange —...
