Over Served in London

“I was over served!” the drunken driver bellows to the police officer who is shining a flashlight into his dilated pupils. Or, asked more delicately, “if you get ill from eating too many oysters, is it fair to blame the oyster bar?” This question formed the underlying tone of this year’s Lloyd’s Shipping Economist Conference. Owners blamed bankers, bankers blamed owners, commercial bankers blamed investment bankers (unfortunately the most noteworthy of them wasn’t there to defend himself), economists blamed poor returns on capital, which was blamed on a lack of shipowner pricing power, which was blamed on the fragmented nature of shipping which was blamed on low barriers to entry, debt blamed equity, equity blamed stock exchanges, terminals blamed liner operators, liner operators blamed terminals and everyone blamed Korean shipyards. Oddly enough, the Asia Crisis seemed to emerge from the proceeding relatively unscathed.

This is only an excerpt of Over Served in London

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