International Container Terminal Services Inc. said Thursday it is optimistic about its 2023 outlook amid inflationary headwinds and the war in Ukraine which caused global economic instability.
“The company’s business remains strong, and we continue to be very prudent in our actions and are watching very closely our costs and managing each and every terminal. We believe that these problems will continue for the foreseeable future, but the company will overcome them eventually,” ICTSI chairman and president Enrique Razon Jr. said during the company’s virtual annual stockholders’ meeting.
Razon said 2022 was a “relatively quiet year” for acquiring new terminals, but “we expect that to change in the near future.”
“On the other hand, we undertook expansion projects at the MICT [Manila International Container Terminal], VICT [Victoria International Container Terminal] in Australia and Contecon Manzanillo in Mexico likewise for Matadi Gateway Terminal (MGT) in DR Congo and OMT in Nigeria,” he said.
“In July, we acquired majority ownership of a multi-purpose terminal in Lamongan Regency, East Java, Indonesia. The East Java Multipurpose Terminal is our 11th terminal in Asia Pacific,” Razon said.
Razon said the group’s estimated capital expenditure for 2023 is about $400 million, higher from last year’s $386.45 million.
“This will be used for ongoing expansion in VICT, Contecon Manzanillo, MICT and MGT and is primarily a spill over from last year,” he said.
“It will also go into the second tranche of concession extension related expenditures in Madagascar, yard expansion at OMT and berth expansion at Rio Brasil Terminal,” Razon said.
ICTSI booked a net income of $618.46 million last year, up 44 percent from $428.57 million in 2021. Revenue from port operations went up by 20 percent to $2.24 billion from $1.87 billion.
ICTSI handled consolidated volume of 12,216,190 twenty-foot equivalent units in 2022, or 9 percent more than 11,163,473 TEUs it handled in the same period in 2021.