Maersk, the world’s largest shipping and logistics company, posted a net profit of $5.438 billion for the June-September period. The company benefitted from record freight-container prices twenty months after the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
Soaring shipping prices boosted Maersk’s earnings before taxes and interest to $5.9 billion and total sales to $16.6 billion in the third quarter, setting a new sales and profit performance record for the Denmark-based company.
Founded in 1904, Maersk is undertaking a significant restructuring to shift its focus to transportation and logistics, following the 2017 sale of its oil division to TotalEnergies.
As a result of supply chain congestion continuing to disrupt international trade, Maersk hopes to provide additional flexibility and support to its customers by turning to aviation.
The company announced on Tuesday its acquisition of an air cargo company, Senator International.
Ships, for instance, have been stagnating outside ports as a result of coronavirus outbreaks and a related shortage of truck drivers needed to move products to stores and eventually to consumers.
The acquisition of Senator International, a Hamburg, Germany-based global freight forwarder, will enable access to more aircraft, rail capacity, warehousing, distribution, and packaging in all of the Americas, Asia, Europe, and South Africa continents.
Maersk said that this global chaos in international logistics is not expected to be resolved any time soon.
“Supplier delivery times remain lengthy, and there is little visibility into when capacity constraints, including landside bottlenecks in trucking and warehousing, will abate.”
The company further stated that the “ongoing exceptional market situation” is expected to continue until the first quarter of 2022, at least.