NYMAR Live from the NYSE.

The new year’s first serious shipping gathering in NY took place under the aegis of the NY Maritime Association at the New York Stock Exchange.  It was an animated audience that filled the Stock Exchange’s stately hall, though we noted the Exchange’s head of events was relieved that unlike Marine Money Week in 2008 he did not have to contend with 150 more guests than NY City fire codes allowed.

Peter Shaerf, AMA Capital partner and President of NYMAR welcomed the crowd and Bob Gruendel, Partner at DLA Piper brought us to the point of Gazing into the Future through the Crystal Ball and wisely at that point turned to Peter Georgiopoulos, Chairman of Genmar, Genco and Aegean, Duncan Neiderauer, NYSE, CEO and Harvey Pitt currently CEO of Kalorama Partners, but former Head of the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

The following is a short summary paraphrasing the comments, note paraphrasing:
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Backwards Through the Looking Glass

By Peter Shaerf, Managing Director, AMA Capital Partners and President NYMAR

Well, January 2010 could not have come fast enough…it seemed 2009 was the invention of the “Brave New World” — not so much Huxley’s but a whole new economic paradigm. Not a huge distance from the Great Depression, 2009 was the year we saw the Wall Street clown turn on his heels and run…to clown school! Or the downtown financiers move uptown and open a yogurt store (ill advised). Historically, one was even reminded of Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield who, rather than pursue the conventional careers prescribed by their parents, bought a $5 correspondence course in ice-cream making. The rest (“Ben and Jerry’s ice cream” – now a subsidiary of Unilever) is history. There is life outside the conventional walls, and 2009 seemed to be the year of self-discovery.

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Athenian and Viking Confab

In front of a packed crowd at the New York Helmsley, the Hellenic-American and Norwegian-American Chambers of Commerce held their 14th Annual Joint Shipping Conference under the catchy title “Are the Bulls and the Bears Right?”

The day started off with derivatives, a tough topic for early in the morning. Nevertheless, the presenters pulled it off and kept everyone interested. To start off Robert Shaw of Mystras Ventures gave a great overview and primer on freight derivatives. In particular, he emphasized their importance of derivatives for hedging but noted that freight volatility and correlation with other commodities has attracted financial players into the market, a recurrent theme.

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