OOCL’s 2025 financial results reflect the difficult reality facing container shipping carriers operating in an increasingly volatile global trade environment.
The Hong Kong-based line reported annual revenue of $9.7 billion, down 9.3% year on year. Earnings before interest and taxes fell 42% to $1.5 billion, while net profit also declined 41%, reaching the same level.
Despite the drop in earnings, OOCL still recorded a 4% increase in annual volume, handling 7.9 million TEUs during the year.
In its results statement, the company said tariff measures and trade tensions continued to weigh heavily on the sector, particularly on the trans-Pacific trade, where both cargo volumes and freight rates experienced strong swings. The carrier also pointed to policy changes and frontloading activity as factors that disrupted normal post-Lunar New Year seasonality.
Looking ahead, OOCL said one of its main priorities for 2026 is to expand its vertical supply chain offering through more integrated services such as international order processing, cargo management, warehousing and distribution.
Fleet growth remains a key part of its strategy. In 2025, the carrier took delivery of nine 16,828-TEU vessels, strengthening its position on the trans-Pacific trade and indirectly helping restore the LL3 Asia-Europe service, which had previously been suspended due to capacity shortages.
This year, OOCL expects the arrival of the first ships from its order of seven 24,000-TEU methanol dual-fuel vessels, as well as six 13,580-TEU conventional-fuel ships chartered from Seaspan Corporation.
Even so, the company struck a cautious tone on the market outlook. OOCL warned that structural overcapacity across container shipping could put further downward pressure on rates. According to Sea-web data, more than 1 million TEUs of capacity from ships above 10,000 TEUs are due for delivery this year, followed by 2.3 million TEUs in 2027 and 3.4 million TEUs in 2028.
At the same time, scrapping remained almost non-existent in 2025, while vessel ordering continued at a record pace. Drewry reported that 4.8 million TEUs of new ship capacity were ordered in 2025, with another 290,000 TEUs ordered in January 2026 alone.
Although OOCL did not directly mention the Middle East war in its earnings statement, it warned that ongoing geopolitical tensions and changes in economic policy will continue to disrupt supply chains and reshape global trade flows. The line said it will respond by strengthening east-west services, adapting to new trade patterns and increasing its presence in emerging markets to reduce regional risk exposure.
