The working vocabulary of a dry bulk desk.

Broker circulars are written in a shorthand a century old, abbreviated differently by every house. This is what the terms mean — written for someone new to a commercial desk, and useful to anyone checking a definition before a negotiation.

83 of 83 terms

Chartering

Address commissionAddcomm: A commission deducted by the charterer from freight or hire, effectively a discount, distinct from the brokerage commission paid to intermediaries.
Ballast: Sailing without cargo, normally to reach a load port. Ballast time and bunker cost fall to the owner and are a decisive part of whether a cargo is worth taking.
Broker circular: A message circulated by a broker offering a cargo or a vessel to the market. The same cargo is typically circulated by many brokers, in different formats and with varying detail, which is why deduplication matters more than volume.See also · how this works in the platform →
Brokerage: Commission payable to the broker or brokers in the chain, expressed as a percentage of freight or hire. Circulars usually state a total commission figure covering both address and brokerage.
Charter partyCP: The contract of carriage between owner and charterer, usually based on a standard form amended by rider clauses. Where it differs from the recap, disputes follow.
COAContract of affreightment: An agreement to carry a stated quantity of cargo over a period, in multiple shipments, without naming specific vessels at the outset. Common where a cargo owner has a regular programme to cover.
Counter: A response to an offer proposing different terms, which in doing so rejects the original. Negotiations commonly run several rounds of counters before terms converge.
Firm offer: An offer open for acceptance until a stated time, binding if accepted within it. The validity period is part of the offer and is one of the fields most often missed when a circular is read in a hurry.
Fixture: A concluded charter. The point at which terms are agreed and both parties are committed, normally recorded in a recap before the formal charter party is drawn up.
LaycanLaydays / cancelling: The window during which the vessel must arrive and tender notice of readiness. The first date is the earliest the charterer is obliged to accept her; the cancelling date is the point after which the charterer may walk away from the fixture. A tight laycan is one of the commonest reasons a commercially attractive vessel is unsuitable.See also · how this works in the platform →
Position: Where a vessel is, and when and where she next becomes open for employment. The position list is the central working document of an owner's chartering desk.See also · how this works in the platform →
RecapRecapitulation: A message setting out all agreed terms of a fixture, sent to confirm what has been concluded. In practice it is the operative document for weeks before the charter party is signed, which is why what it says — and whether anyone re-typed it accurately — matters commercially.See also · how this works in the platform →
SubjectsSubs: Conditions that must be satisfied before a fixture becomes firm — commonly subject to management approval, subject to shippers, or subject to satisfactory vetting. A fixture on subs is not yet a fixture.
TC-in / TC-out: Taking a vessel on time charter and chartering her out again. Operators earn on the spread between what they pay and what they earn, which means the position has to be managed as a spread rather than as two separate contracts.See also · how this works in the platform →
Time charterTC: The vessel is hired for a period, with the charterer directing employment and paying hire per day plus bunkers and port costs. The owner retains operation of the ship.
Tonnage: Used loosely to mean available shipping capacity. An open tonnage list is the set of vessels available for employment in a region over a period.
Voyage charter: The vessel is engaged for a specific voyage carrying a specific cargo, with the owner bearing voyage costs and the charterer paying freight, usually per tonne.

Laytime

Arrived ship: The legal condition a vessel must satisfy before valid notice can be given — broadly, that she has reached the agreed destination and is at the charterer's disposal. Whether that means the berth or the port depends on the charter.
Demurrage: Liquidated damages payable by the charterer when laytime is exceeded, at the daily rate agreed in the charter party. Claims are lost far more often on missing evidence than on faulty calculation.
Demurrage rate: The daily rate at which demurrage accrues, agreed in the charter party, usually pro rata for part of a day.
Despatch: A payment from owner to charterer where loading or discharging is completed in less than the allowed laytime. Commonly agreed at half the demurrage rate.
Free pratique: Clearance by port health authorities permitting the vessel to interact with the shore. Often a precondition for valid notice of readiness.
Laytime: The time allowed to the charterer for loading and discharging without additional payment. Calculated from the agreed rates and terms, it begins once notice of readiness has been validly tendered and any notice period has run.See also · how this works in the platform →
NORNotice of readiness: The notice given by the master confirming the vessel has arrived and is ready to load or discharge. Its valid tender normally starts the laytime clock, which makes the recorded time and date of a small message unusually valuable.
Reversible laytime: Load and discharge laytime treated as a single combined allowance, so time saved at one end offsets time lost at the other. Non-reversible laytime is calculated separately at each port.
SHEXSundays and holidays excepted: Laytime does not run on Sundays and public holidays. Whether it runs when work is nonetheless performed on those days depends on the wording — 'unless used' and 'even if used' produce different results.
SHINCSundays and holidays included: Laytime runs continuously, including Sundays and public holidays. More favourable to the owner than SHEX.
SOFStatement of facts: A port document recording the chronology of a call — arrival, notice, berthing, commencement and completion of cargo work, and every interruption. The primary evidence in any laytime dispute.
Turn time: A grace period between the tendering of notice of readiness and the commencement of laytime, allowing the charterer time to prepare.
WWDWeather working day: A day on which work would normally be carried out and weather does not prevent it. Time lost to weather is excluded from laytime, which is a frequent source of dispute over what the weather actually was.

Cargo

Bill of ladingB/L: The document issued on shipment, serving as receipt for the cargo, evidence of the contract of carriage and, where negotiable, a document of title.
Deadfreight: Freight payable on cargo space booked but not used, where the charterer fails to supply the agreed quantity.
Draft survey: Determining cargo quantity by measuring the vessel's displacement before and after loading. The commonest method of establishing bill of lading quantity in dry bulk.
Group A cargo: Under the IMSBC Code, cargoes that may liquefy if their moisture content exceeds the transportable moisture limit. Iron ore fines and certain concentrates fall here, which is why moisture certification matters commercially, not just technically.
Hold cleaning: Preparation of cargo holds to the standard the next cargo requires. Grain after coal typically requires cleaning and inspection, which is why the previous cargoes determine whether a vessel is even a candidate.See also · how this works in the platform →
IMSBC CodeInternational Maritime Solid Bulk Cargoes Code: The IMO code governing the safe carriage of solid bulk cargoes, including classification, required documentation and carriage requirements.
MOLCHOPTMore or less in charterer's option: The quantity tolerance sits with the charterer. The counterpart to MOLOO, and a material difference when estimating.
MOLOOMore or less in owner's option: The quantity tolerance sits with the owner, who declares the final figure within the agreed range. Affects who bears the risk of deadfreight.
Stowage factorSF: The volume occupied by a unit weight of cargo, typically cubic metres per tonne. Iron ore fines are dense and fill a vessel's deadweight long before her cubic capacity; grain is light and fills the cubic first. Checking deadweight alone will confirm cargoes that physically will not fit.See also · how this works in the platform →
TMLTransportable moisture limit: The maximum moisture content at which a cargo liable to liquefaction may safely be carried. Cargo above it should not be loaded.
Trimming: Levelling bulk cargo within the holds after loading, for stability and to make full use of capacity. Whether it is included in the freight depends on the freight basis.

Vessel

AboutAbt: A tolerance on warranted speed and consumption, commonly understood as around half a knot and five per cent, though the charter party governs.
Capesize: Large bulk carriers, broadly 100,000 DWT and above, too large for the older canal locks and traditionally routed via the Cape. The principal iron ore and coal tonnage.
Constants: The weight of items permanently aboard beyond the vessel's lightweight — stores, spares, residues, crew effects. Deducted, with bunkers and ballast, from deadweight to give the cargo actually liftable, which is usually less than the circular implies.
DWTDeadweight tonnage: The total weight a vessel can carry — cargo, bunkers, stores, fresh water and crew — at her assigned draft. Not the same as the cargo she can actually lift.See also · how this works in the platform →
Geared / gearless: Whether the vessel has her own cranes. Gearless vessels depend on shore equipment, which restricts which berths are available and shifts handling cost between the parties.
Grain / bale capacity: Two measures of hold volume. Grain capacity assumes cargo flows into every space; bale capacity assumes packaged cargo bounded by frames and beams. Which applies depends on the cargo.
Handysize: The smallest of the main dry bulk classes, roughly 10,000 to 40,000 DWT, usually geared and able to work smaller ports.
IMO number: A permanent seven-digit identifier assigned to a vessel's hull, unchanged by renaming or reflagging — which makes it the only reliable key for matching records across sources.
Kamsarmax: A Panamax variant of around 80,000 to 85,000 DWT, sized to the maximum length able to load at Port Kamsar in Guinea.
Panamax: Bulk carriers of roughly 65,000 to 80,000 DWT, historically sized to the original Panama Canal locks.
PSCPort state control: Inspection of foreign vessels in national ports for compliance with international conventions. Detentions and deficiencies form part of a vessel's record and affect acceptability.
RightShip: A vetting and rating service widely used in dry bulk, particularly by major ore and coal charterers. For many cargoes the rating is a hard requirement rather than a preference.
Speed and consumptionSpd/cons: The warranted service speed and daily fuel consumption, usually qualified by 'about'. The basis of voyage estimates and of performance claims where the vessel does not achieve them.
SSWSummer salt water: The load line applicable in salt water in summer zones. Draft differs between salt, brackish and fresh water — at a river berth the difference is centimetres, and at Capesize centimetres are thousands of tonnes.
Supramax / Ultramax: Geared bulk carriers of roughly 50,000 to 65,000 DWT, Ultramax being the larger and more recent development of the type.
TFWTropical fresh water: The load line for fresh water in tropical zones, permitting a deeper draft than SSW because of lower water density.
TPCTonnes per centimetre immersion: The weight required to change the vessel's mean draft by one centimetre. Central to draft surveys and to working out how much cargo a draft restriction actually costs.

Market

Baltic Exchange: The London-based membership organisation that publishes the dry bulk freight indices and route assessments used across the trade as benchmarks.
BDIBaltic Dry Index: A composite index published by the Baltic Exchange, based on rates across the main dry bulk vessel classes. Useful as a market signal, too broad to benchmark a specific fixture against.
Benchmarking: Comparing an achieved or estimated rate against the published assessment for the nearest comparable route and vessel size. What distinguishes a good desk from a good market.See also · how this works in the platform →
C3: A Baltic Capesize route, Tubarão to Qingdao — iron ore from Brazil to China. The reference for Brazil–Far East ore fixtures.
C5: A Baltic Capesize route, Western Australia to Qingdao. The reference for the shorter Australia–China ore trade.
FFAForward freight agreement: A cash-settled derivative on freight rates for a route and period, used to hedge or take a position on the freight market rather than to move cargo.
P6: A Baltic Panamax time charter route, a trans-Atlantic round voyage. Used to benchmark Panamax employment in the Atlantic basin.
TCETime charter equivalent: Voyage earnings expressed as a daily rate, calculated by deducting voyage costs from freight revenue and dividing by voyage days. The standard measure allowing a voyage charter to be compared with a time charter, and the number most commercial decisions turn on.See also · how this works in the platform →

Operations

AgentPort agent: The party appointed to attend the vessel at a port, arranging clearance, berthing, services and documentation, and accounting for costs through the PDA and FDA.
Bunkers: Marine fuel. Usually the largest single voyage cost, and the one most sensitive to speed decisions.
ETA / ETB / ETD: Estimated time of arrival, of berthing and of departure. The gap between arrival and berthing is where congestion becomes demurrage.
FDAFinal disbursement account: The agent's final statement of port costs after the call, reconciled against the PDA and the funds advanced.
MGOMarine gas oil: A distillate fuel, more expensive than residual grades, commonly used in emission control areas and for manoeuvring.
Off-hire: A period during which hire ceases to be payable under a time charter because the vessel is unavailable through breakdown, deficiency or other cause specified in the charter.
PDAProforma disbursement account: An agent's estimate of the costs of a port call, submitted for approval and funding before the call. Checking it against what the voyage estimate assumed is where overruns are caught cheaply.See also · how this works in the platform →
ROBRemaining on board: Bunkers remaining aboard at a given point, typically recorded at delivery and redelivery under a time charter and at each port call.
VLSFOVery low sulphur fuel oil: Fuel oil at or below 0.50% sulphur, the standard compliant grade outside emission control areas since the 2020 sulphur cap.
Voyage instructions: Instructions issued to the master and agents covering the intended voyage — ports, cargo, speed, reporting requirements and commercial terms relevant to execution.

Finance

FIOTFree in and out trimmed: A freight basis under which the charterer bears loading, discharging and trimming costs. FIOST adds stowage. Freight quoted on different bases is not directly comparable.
Freight: The sum payable for carriage under a voyage charter, usually expressed per metric tonne of cargo, sometimes as a lump sum.
Hire: The daily sum payable under a time charter for use of the vessel, normally paid in advance and subject to off-hire deductions.
Liner terms: A freight basis under which the owner bears cargo handling costs at one or both ends, in contrast to FIO terms.
PMTPer metric tonne: The basis on which voyage freight is normally quoted in dry bulk.
Settlement: Closing out the financial position on a voyage — freight and hire collected, disbursements reconciled, demurrage or despatch agreed and claims resolved.See also · how this works in the platform →
Voyage result: Freight revenue less voyage costs for a completed voyage — the figure against which the original estimate is measured.See also · how this works in the platform →

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