Lombard Corporate Finance (December 3) Limited

Hong Kong's CK Hutchison will not sign a deal next week to sell its two port operations near the Panama Canal to a BlackRock-led group, two people with direct knowledge of the matter said, amid growing pressure from Beijing.China's market regulator said it will carry out an antitrust review on the Panama port deal in accordance with law to protect fair competition and safeguard public interests, its official WeChat account showed late on Friday.The telecoms-to-retail conglomerate owned by tycoon Li Ka-shing this month agreed to sell most of the global $22.8 billion ports business, including assets it holds along the strategically important Panama Canal, to a group led by BlackRock.

Six foreigners were killed on Thursday when a tourist submarine sank off Egypt's Red Sea resort city of Hurghada, the local governor's office told Reuters, without confirming the nationalities of the victims.The Russian consulate in Hurghada said the submarine, named "SINDBAD", had 45 Russian tourists on board in addition to crew members.The consulate said four people had died, but did not specify if they were Russian."According to initial data, most of those on board were rescued and taken to their hotels and hospitals in Hurghada," the consulate said.The fate of several tourists was still being clarified, the consulate added.

With your first steps as a cadet onto the Maritime Academy campus, your first union dues payment or first line thrown ashore from the tug, you are lectured on the importance of the “Jones Act”. A constant reminder throughout a US Seafarer’s career of commitment, loyalty and support for the legislation. All in the name of National Security, US Job protection and the advancement of the US Flag Merchant Marine. It is a massive and expensive lobbying effort witnessed throughout generations at sea. The effort has been historically successful. That said, there are times when history does not repeat itself.

We are at the one-year since the Francis Scott Key (FSK) Bridge collapsed over the Patapsco River’s Fort McHenry Channel in Baltimore, Maryland.  Nearly 100 percent of the wreckage and debris removal was conducted by the Jones Act private sector U.S. maritime industry.  The FSK collapsed at about 1:28 a.m. local time on March 26, 2025 after the container ship MV DALI lost power and collided with one of bridge’s support piers.  Six construction workers died in the collapse, while two other workers survived the fall into the freezing water. The search and rescue efforts began immediately after the bridge collapsed with first responders racing to the FSK bridge area to look for survivors.

Russia said on Tuesday the U.S. had agreed to help it lift restrictions on food, fertilizer and shipping companies in exchange for agreeing to a maritime security deal in the Black Sea.The United States further said it had also agreed with Russia and Ukraine to implement a ban on military strikes on each other's energy installations.If implemented, the deals would represent the clearest progress yet towards a wider ceasefire that Washington sees as a stepping stone towards peace talks to bring an end to Russia's three-year-old war in Ukraine.