State subsidies prop up China shipping lines amid industry slump

Shanghai

AS China's economic slowdown squeezes the global shipping industry, three of the country's biggest domestic cargo freighters likely skirted the losses that plagued international peers last year thanks to a five-fold jump in state subsidies.

Boosted by hundreds of millions of dollars in cash grants from Beijing for scrapping old vessels, China Cosco, China Shipping Development and China Shipping Container Lines will report 2014 earnings starting later on Thursday showing some of their best profits in years.