Transport Update 23rd September

Asia → North America

Rates

• Rates remain stable this week, with no major increases.
  • We are still seeing ranges of $14,000 to $18,000 to L.A and the US West Coast.
  • $20,000 to $24,000 ranges to the East Coast.
  • $22,000+ to the MidWest of the USA
• The Indian subcontinent continues to see elevated rates as congestion and equipment shortages remain.

Capacity

• Two new weekly shuttle services have been announced
  • The Puma Shuttle runs from Shenzhen to Long Beach
  • The Mustang Service runs from Shanghai to LongBeach
•  There has been a redeployment of services from other secondary trade lanes. For example, 50% of services between Asia and the Middle East are currently blank sailings.
• Carriers are shifting their vessels to Transpacific routes from China to the US.
  • Bottlenecks in the supply chain caused by a lack of space are stopping vessels from proceeding.
  • CMA has introduced another Indmex 2 service. This route goes between the Indian subcontinent via the Suez Canal to the East Coast on a weekly basis.

Equipment

• Ongoing reports of a shortage of drayage drivers, as well as a critical shortage of the chassis which truckers use to transport containers.

Ports

• The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach have announced a move towards 24/7 operations, extended night and weekend gate periods to alleviate congestion. This week saw a record 70 ships waiting to berth.
  • The vessels are experiencing delays of nearly two weeks. Records of vessels waiting to berth have been broken since 10th September on a daily basis.
• Other West Coast ports have berthing delays of 4-5 days.
• On the East Coast, delays are less severe compared to the West Coast
  • Norfolk is working normally
  • New York has delays of a day
  • Louisville is working normally
  • Chicago is experiencing severe delays in terms of rail and sea transportation.

Asia → Europe (Far East Westbound)

Rates

• Hapag Lloyd are joining CMA in the rates freeze announcement. However, the differences between the two include:
  • Hapag Lloyd has announced a rates and surcharge freeze.
  • Whereas CMA only mentions a rate freeze. This is mostly applicable on the Asia to Europe trade, on the very high spot rates market.

Capacity

• October looks to be challenging in terms of space
  • The last blank sailing table calculates 8 vessels, totalling to 145,000 TEUs out, which is a third of the capacity out.
  • Week 39 – 2M Alliance takes out two vessels, totalling to 32,000 TEUs
  • Week 41 – The 2M and the Ocean Alliance take out together two vessels, totalling to 29,000 TEU
  • Week 42 – the 3 Alliances take out 4 vessels, totalling to 84,000 TEUs
• Exports from India increased 45.8% year-on-year last month, with competition for exporters space and containers likely to remain fierce.
• In the latest example of NVOCCs entering the charter market, a Hong Kong-based unit of a UK forwarder has begun chartering multipurpose ships from China and Hong Kong to the UK and Europe.

Equipment

• Evergreen and Maersk are experiencing severe shortages on the China mainland ports.
  Other carriers appear to be more balanced.

Air