South Korea’s Hyundai Merchant Marine Co. (HMM) has withdrawn from a joint bid with MSC for a controlling 54% stake in Total Terminals International LLC (TTI), an operator of Long Beach Terminal, California, writes The Wall Street Journal.
In the beginning of December HMM and MSC formed a consortium to jointly acquire the stake in Hanjin’s US terminal operator, after another contender, Korea Line, withdrew its bid. The remaining 46% stake in the terminal operator is already held by MSC. TTI’s Long Beach container terminal has an annual capacity of 3 mln TEU and equipped with super-Post-Panamax gantry cranes capable of handling vessels of over 10,000 TEU.
Now HMM plans to later take a minority stake in TTI. “Considering our low credit ratings, we thought it would be better for MSC to make a solo bid. We agreed to buy a stake from MSC later, – Hyundai CEO C.K. Yoo told The Wall Street Journal in an interview. – We intend to get a low double-digit stake in the terminal, which we need to save costs for cargo unloading”.
Following the recently signed agreement to enter into a ”strategic cooperation” with the 2M Alliance of Maersk Line and MSC, HMM announced plans to take 5% of global market share by 2021. Today the carrier controls 2.2% of global container capacity.