INTERVIEW-DHL upbeat on peak season demand; eyes price rises

SINGAPORE, Nov 12 (Reuters) - DHL, a unit of Deutsche Post (DPWGn.DE), expects a normal peak season for global trade in the final weeks of this year, the CEO of DHL's global forwarding and freight business said in an interview on Thursday. "The good news is, it is a normal peak season profile -- the problem that came in the past year was that airlines pulled out a lot of capacity," Hermann Ude told Reuters when asked how the holiday season was shaping up.

"You have to be careful. There is a lot of buffer in the replenishment and all that," Ude, a board member of Deutsche Post, said.

Europe's biggest mail and express delivery company competes with United Parcel Service (UPS.N) and Fedex Corp (FDX.N).

Sluggish consumer spending and shrinking business investment have hurt shipping companies around the world this year.

"On the airfreight side, the enormous capacity crunch we currently see, leads the general rate increase and we have exposed the rate increase to our customers," Ude said. He added that prices were likely to rise by at least 20 percent, depending on trade routes.

With revenue of 7.9 billion euros ($11.9 billion), DHL's forwarding and freight business accounted for about a quarter of Deutsche Post's revenue in the nine months to September.

($1=.6666 euro)

(Reporting by Harry Suhartono and Anshuman Daga; Editing by Jan Dahinten)

((harry.suhartono@thomsonreuters.com; +65 6403 5658; Reuters Messaging: harry.suhartono.reuters.com@reuters.net)

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