Page 13: of Maritime Logistics Professional Magazine (Q1 2013)

fering Southeast Asian itineraries. Royal Caribbean, ranked behind Carnival, also noted the im- pact of the Costa Concordia. RCL?s Chairman and CEO, Rich- ard Fain, told investors on its Q3 2012 conference call, ??we are still navigating an environment overshadowed by severe po- litical and economic turmoil and the tail of the Costa Concordia effect.? Mr. Fain, speaking to investors in late October, 2012, added, ?The European market though continues to be the most puzzling market we?re facing. The impact of the tragedy in It- aly was obviously centered in Europe. Now that impact does continue to wane, but some of the effects still linger, and we continue to learn and be proactive in trying to recover from it.? Headwinds The bottom line, looking back, is that the cruise sector did see headwinds from last January?s accident (ominously, on Friday the 13th), but also from Europe?s economic downturn. RCL?s Fain, responding to an analyst question about the likely improvement in his company?s yield, answered, in part: ?? we?ve effectively raised it back to the original forecast of around 3%. It?s dif cult for us to really pinpoint how much of that was due to the (Costa Concordia) incident, how much of that was due to a softer European economy.? Yet, RCL was telegraphing full speed ahead during 2012?s  nal week, when it announced an order for a third ?Oasis? class 5,400 passen-ger vessel, to be delivered from STX France (in a switch from STX Finland - which built the two prior vessels) in 2016 at an undisclosed price, but presumed to exceed $1 billion. Separately, in mid January 2013, private equity  rms TPG and Apollo, along with an Asian cruise operator Genting, were able to  oat off a $446 million chunk of their investments in Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings (the parent of Norwegian www.maritimeprofessional.com I Maritime Professional I 13MP #1 1-17.indd 13MP #1 1-17.indd 132/25/2013 11:56:05 AM2/25/2013 11:56:05 AM