Baltic Index Hits Over Two-month High

The Baltic Exchange's main sea freight index on Friday hit an over two-month high on higher vessel rates across segments, and along with the capesize index posted its highest weekly rise since mid-June.

The Baltic dry index, which tracks rates for ships ferrying dry bulk commodities and reflects rates for capesize, panamax and supramax vessels, was up 62 points, or 3.9%, at 1,667 points.

The index gained 28.6% this week.

The capesize index gained 161 points, or 5.8%, at 2,915 points, also scaling an over two-month high. The capesize index gained 53.4% this week.

Average daily earnings for capesizes, which typically transport 150,000-tonne cargoes such as iron ore and coal, were up $1,337 to $24,178.

The panamax index was up 19 points, or 1.4%, at 1,380 points.

Average daily earnings for panamaxes, which usually carry coal or grain cargoes of about 60,000 to 70,000 tonnes, increased $176 to $12,423.

Among smaller vessels, the supramax index rose nine points to 992 points, while the handysize index rose six points to 585 points.

(Reporting by Arundhati Sarkar; Editing by Ramakrishnan M.)