Intermodal Segment

Due to the planned realignment of POLZUG activities, HHLA’s transport companies posted a decline of 2.5 % in the highly competitive market for container traffic in the hinterland of major seaports in the first nine months of 2018. Transport volume declined from 1,126 thousand standard containers (TEU) in the corresponding period last year to 1,098 thousand TEU. Whereas road transport continued to decrease, rail transport was able to return to the prior-year level due to a strong performance in the third quarter. Compared with the previous year, rail transport rose marginally by 0.3 % to 864 thousand TEU (previous year: 861 thousand TEU). Due to a significant decrease in freight volume in the greater Hamburg area, road transport fell by 11.7 % year-on-year to 234 thousand TEU (previous year: 265 thousand TEU).

With growth of 3.9 % to € 324.0 million (previous year: € 311.8 million), revenue performed much better than transport volume. This positive revenue trend resulted from a slight increase in rail’s share of HHLA’s total intermodal transportation from 76.5 % to 78.7 %, in combination with longer transport distances.

The operating result (EBIT) increased year-on-year to € 65.3 million (previous year: € 55.4 million). This was mainly due to the positive development of average revenues (as a result of changes in the route mix), increased capacity utilisation at the terminal in Budapest (which started operations in mid-2017) and the successful integration of POLZUG (now METRANS Polonia). The EBIT margin rose by 2.3 percentage points to 20.1 % (previous year: 17.8 %).