Clarkson (Horace) PLC
16 May 2000
Details of the Chairman's statement, made during today's Annual General
Meeting of the company, follow:
We are pleased to be able to report that the process of recovery in all
shipping markets in which we operate has started and that we fully expect to
meet the higher levels we set in our 2000 budget.
We have made considerable progress in fulfilling our strategy to position
Clarksons as a leader in the provision of value added services through both
organic growth and acquisitions. We recently expanded our range of shipping
related services with the formation of Clarkson Financial Services, which
offers an unique blend of ship financing and capital markets' expertise, and
we expect to unveil further initiatives over the coming months.
We are committed to remain ahead of the competition in this arena and are
actively seeking further acquisitions in the shipping services area.
The last twelve months have seen rapid changes in the way in which businesses
wish to trade and use the technology available to them. Your Company is well
placed to take advantage of these developments, having invested heavily in
developing an integrated e-business strategy. We have established SIN, our
unique real-time and online market intelligence service and have also
announced our involvement with LevelSeas.com, an electronic exchange for
marine services and participation in OceanConnect.com, a platform that will
initially develop trading in marine fuels.