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Conflict in the Middle East is having ripple effects on global trade. Two shipping companies said on Friday that they are pausing traffic through the Red Sea following attacks on their ships.
“Following the near-miss incident involving Maersk Gibraltar yesterday and yet another attack on a container vessel today, we have instructed all Maersk vessels in the area bound to pass through the Bab al-Mandab Strait to pause their journey until further notice,” Maersk said in a statement.
The company accounts for almost 20% of global container traffic.
Another major container-shipping firm,
Hapag-Lloyd,
matched Maersk’s move, saying that following an attack on one of its ships, it would suspend traffic through the Red Sea until Monday.
Hapag-Lloyd
stock advanced 16% in Frankfurt trading, while Maersk rose 7.9% in Copenhagen.
The Bab al-Mandab Strait lies between Yemen on the Arabian Peninsula and Eritrea and Djibouti in the Horn of Africa. That makes it a critical gateway for ships that have passed through the Suez Canal to reach the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean.
The attacks in the past two days aren’t the first in recent weeks. The Iran-backed Houthi movement in Yemen has emerged as a threat to Red Sea shipping since the war between Israel and Hamas began in Gaza in October.
“We are committed to ensuring the best possible stability of our customers’ supply chains, and we are working closely with all our logistics teams and are taking steps to minimise impacts to customers,” Maersk said.
Write to Jack Denton at jack.denton@barrons.com
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