Seatrade-Maritime: CK Hutchison’s damages claims against Panama expand to over $2bn

CK Hutchison’s Panama Ports Company (PPC) has expanded its international arbitration claims against the Republic of Panama.

The claims against Panama relate to the Supreme Court decision that found PPC’s concessions for container terminals in Balboa and Cristobal to unconstitutional and subsequently being taken over by the Panama authorities last month.

CK Hutchison describes the takeover of the terminals as “unlawful” and has taken the case to arbitration under the rules of the International Chamber of Commerce Court.

“PPC supplemented its claims in a filing on 24 March 2026 based on the State’s extreme executive actions, takeover, occupation, seizure of proprietary and protected documents and a range of related misconduct over more than a month that marked a further culmination of the State campaign against PPC that has continued for more than a year.  The State has continued to choose a path of conflict and has not coordinated regarding access to property or compensation, instead making inaccurate statements regarding PPC and its property,” the Hong Kong-headquartered conglomerate said in a statement.

The additional claims bring the total damages being sought by PPC to over $2 billion.

CK Hutchison said Panama had failed to file an initial response to the arbitration.

“It is a fact that Panama itself stated that Panama had not retained counsel and used it as a basis for delay. In a chilling signal to foreign investors, Panama is seeking to slow the arbitration, drag into the case parties that are not a part of the applicable contract, and continue its attack campaign, as PPC had warned.  PPC reserves the right to address any and all issues raised by Panama.”

Panama has handed over temporary operations of the Balboa and Cristobal terminals to Maersk’s APM Terminals and MSC’s TiL respectively, for a period of 18 months.