Proposals to eject handysize vessels from the Baltic Exchange’s overall dry bulk shipping index have excited strong opposition, but the ships have historically gone in and out of the general reckoning, and even the critics want a rebalancing. So what is the problem?

In defending its plans to drop handysize ships from the Baltic Dry Index (BDI), the exchange says that over its 32-year history the broad reflection of dry bulk trading patterns has not represented all sectors of the shipping market all the time.