Billionaire shipping magnate dies aged 98

The shy Mc-Kinney Moeller turned two small shipping companies that his father had created into a global corporate giant with 108,000 workers across 130 countries.

The Moeller-Maersk group owns the world’s biggest publicly-held container shipping group, Maersk Sealand.

Chairman Michael Pram Rasmussen said the company had “lost a businessman of international scope and a man who...can take credit for the group being among the world’s leading (businesses) and Denmark’s undisputed largest business.”

Flags at the Copenhagen headquarters were flown at half-mast.

Mc-Kinney Moeller stepped down as board chairman in 2003, at the age of 90. Five months earlier, he steered the two companies that formed the nucleus of the A.P. Moeller group through a merger, creating A.P. Moller-Maersk A/S.

Although he withdrew from day-to-day management in 1993 Mc-Kinney Moeller continued to be involved in management decisions.

In high spirits but visibly frail, Mc-Kinney Moeller made his last public appearance on Thursday at the group’s general assembly in Copenhagen.