Antonio Carrillo
Management
Sure. This is Antonio, Bascom. So let me give you some thoughts. I mentioned that about half of the backlog we have in barges will be delivered in 2020, and we had a slower order this quarter in barges than the first quarter. The first quarter was incredibly high but -- and this quarter was very complicated for customers. The river system was flooded, and they were basically trying to keep their business going with all those variables moving around them. Since the end of the quarter, I mentioned we continued to see good inquiries for barges, both on the liquid and the dry side, more on the liquid side. So we are -- and if you look at the barge replacement cycle, both on the dry side and the liquid side, there is -- on the liquid side about 25% of the barges in the fleet are over 20 years old, and we've seen a trend in barges being built -- being, let's say, replaced with shorter periods. So some of the larger companies are replacing their barges at 20 years, rather than 30 years. So you see the fleet, there is, I think, a very, very good indication that the demand for tank barges is going to be good over the next few years. On the dry cargo side, of course, we know the decline in coal, but also the fleet size and the fleet replacement cycle seems to be a good indicator that there is going to be -- we should expect some additional demand in the future. Also steel prices, I mentioned, should help that demand come through as steel prices peaked a few months ago, close to $1,000, now they're close to $700. So there's, I think, good economic factors that should also help drive the demand for barges. On the rail component side, our -- let me just continue on the barge, also the dynamics in the fundamentals of the shipping industry in the barge, rates have become better. The river system is becoming more efficient as the water recedes. So things are looking better. On the component side, I mentioned the battles for the rail OEMs have continued to go down. So as those volumes come down, we'll know more in the next few months. Volumes could be -- for our components could be lower. I think the pricing we already -- are having some impact this year and we'll see depending on how those volumes look, how pricing look for the following years. But overall, we're happy with the way the ramp up is going on our barge -- in our barge group. We've been able to get the people, we launched our first barge. We are really optimistic of how things are going.