Bis repeated. As for its previous financial year, the maritime carrier CMA CGM announced the largest profit in France (24.9 billion dollars, against 17.9 in 2021). The kind of news that annoys in France, but also across the Atlantic.
A year ago, on March 1, 2022, in his State of the Union address, the President of the United States launched the offensive against shipping companies: “A small half-dozen foreign shipowners raised prices by up to 1,000% and made record profits. Tonight, I am announcing that we are launching a crackdown on these companies that overtax American businesses and American consumers,” said Joe Biden.
The next day, CMA CGM and its major competitors – which have the particularity of not being American – received an official form from Congress requiring them to answer specific questions, with supporting documents, concerning their unallocated capacities, the increase in their tariffs and their “huge profits”. A few weeks later, the German company Hapag-Lloyd, accused of having charged unreasonably high storage prices in the port of Los Angeles, agreed to pay a fine of 2 million dollars. Joe Biden does not let go, sends tweets, presents an Ocean Shipping Reform Act in June, to restore order and better control the sector.
Case taken very seriously
From Marseille, the CMA CGM staff takes the matter very seriously and puts the means to counter the attacks. Krister Holladay, ex-collaborator of republican figures (Kay Granger, Saxby Chambliss, Newt Gingrich), became director of public affairs for APL, one of the subsidiaries of the French group, is given a budget of 500,000 dollars.
For $240,000, a lobbying firm, Van Scoyoc, mobilizes a team of eight people who also have strong connections within Congress. Protection of whales, taxation (CMA CGM benefits from a special status granted by the European Union), vessel speed limits, loading times, etc.
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All the draft texts likely to hinder the giant of the seas are scrutinized and are the subject of an information campaign with American elected officials, in particular on the Republican side. There’s no evidence that he was causally linked, but Congress was less tough and quietly dropped its investigation. Better still, on February 7, there were no traces of shipowners and their record profits in the State of the Union speech by Joe Biden, who this year preferred to attack the superprofits of the oil majors.
Avoid legal action
In addition to lobbying, the CEO of CMA CGM Rodolphe Saadé knew how to use a massive weapon authorized by his profits by paying for an amount estimated at nearly 5 billion dollars, port facilities in Los Angeles and New York. . Enough to publish a beautiful press release: “The group will continue to give priority to improving its quality of service to satisfy its customers in the United States.”
Shipping carrier CMA CGM has announced France’s biggest profit for the 2022 financial year.
And Rodolphe Saadé to promise that it will no longer be a question of “waiting three weeks before being able to land in Los Angeles”. Efficiency and pragmatism are values that are well shared across the Atlantic. But the United States also has the particularity of being judicialized. The Federal Maritime Commission has considerably simplified the procedures for suing shipowners. In the second half of 2022 alone, no less than 175 actions were launched.
By Anna Rousseau and Cole Stangler
