American West Line fell below $2,000! Europe's congested ports have to reduce classes on a large scale, and begin to charge extra cabin fees?
Affected by the global environment, such as epidemic, inflation, strikes and weak demand, the logistics supply chain is in chaos, the freight rates of major routes in the market are falling all the way, and the container transportation market is cold in the peak season, and then the shipping market is full of variables.
Market chaos! The price of freight on the western line of the United States fell below $2,000.
During the 11-day holiday, the freight transportation market staged two days of ice and fire, and the price of freight on the American-Western line fell by $2,000. However, the European line was blocked because of the strike of two British ports, and began to pay extra for cabin expenses.
According to some people in the industry, the recent 30% or more decrease in cargo volume on the US-West Line coincides with the increase in capacity of new ships invested by container shipping companies. The situation of oversupply is severe, and the market rapidly reverses, and it enters the buyer's market from the seller's market. In order to grab the goods, the spot freight rate per FEU from China to Meixi has dropped below 2000 USD from the end of September to the beginning of October.
According to the person in charge of a large freight forwarding company, the market situation on the western line of the United States is quite chaotic. Some shipping companies have already offered freight rates of $1,700 /FEU for direct passengers. The freight rates of the three major alliance ships in the spot market are $1,950, and the freight rates of non-alliance ships have even dropped to $1,800-$1,900.
It is understood that most of the shipping companies of the three major shipping alliances have deployed 10,000-container ships to operate the US-West Line, so it is still profitable at the current freight rate, but the pressure of cabin filling is also high, and the loading rate is about 70-90%. These freight forwarders either don't want to sacrifice the vacancy rate, or in order to maintain the market share and maintain the customer relationship, they join the bargaining.
At present, the trans-Pacific freight rate has plummeted by more than 75% compared with the same period of last year, because the demand for freight transportation has been greatly reduced by the cancellation of suppliers' orders and efforts to clear inventory by large retailers. For this reason, container shipping companies were forced to cut their shifts to cope with it. According to the data of shipping data providers Xeneta and Sea-Intelligence, the freight space provided by container shipping companies operating Pacific routes in September decreased by 13% compared with the same period of last year, equivalent to reducing the freight volume of 21 8000TEU container ships.
At the same time, the shift reduction of container shipping companies is getting more and more serious. Within two weeks from October 3rd, about 40 and 21 boat trips from Asia to West America and East America were cancelled. In the same period over the years, only 2-4 boat trips were cancelled on average.
Strike port closure! Will the European line also usher in a large-scale suspension and reduction of classes? Does the European line start to charge for cabin purchase?
The situation in Europe is just the opposite. Europe's two major British ports, Felixstowe and Liverpool, went on strike one after another, resulting in the congestion of Rotterdam, Hamburg and other important ports in Europe. In order to reserve the cargo in the first half of October, a shipping company proposed a freight rate of less than $5,000 per FEU before the November holiday. As a result, it was found that some shipping classes had already started to explode due to the reduction of classes and port congestion, so the quoted freight rate began to be charged with $300-$500 for shipping.
At present, the second round of strikes is going on in Felixstowe Port, which just ended on October 5th. The port of Liverpool, which just ended its two-week strike, announced that it would hold the second round of strike on October 11th-17th. The two major ports accounted for about 60% of British container imports, resulting in the waiting time of Rotterdam and Hamburg as alternative ports being lengthened from 7 days to 12-14 days.
In addition, it has recently been reported that following the recent suspension and reduction of trans-Pacific route services, the three major alliances are considering suspending or merging some Asia-Nordic loop services to mitigate the impact of the sharp drop in bookings and slow down the erosion of the sharp drop in freight rates.
Most of the industry believe that Europe and the United States have been digesting stocks for a long time, and with the devaluation of Asian currencies, the volume of European and American lines is expected to pick up in the second half of October. Although it is estimated that the growth rate is not high, it will help the market freight rate to stabilize or even slightly pick up. Whether the off-season is not weak in the fourth quarter is estimated that a clue can be seen one week after the end of the 11-day holiday.
Despite this, some people in the industry who are pessimistic pointed out that the global high inflation and monetary tightening have caused the international transportation demand to freeze rapidly, resulting in the continuous drop of freight rates. The global market economy trend is filled with pessimism. It is expected that container orders will continue to be impacted in the fourth quarter, and freight rates will continue to fall.