EC freight futures traded sharply higher on 30 September with all contracts from December 2024 to August 2025 hitting their 20% maximum daily limit, bringing their weekly gains to 41% to 55%. The US East Coast ports strike is driving the bullish short-term sentiment despite continued weakness on the Asia-Europe freight market as the SCFIS fell by 3.7% on 30 September while the SCFI dropped by 13% last week as carriers continued to slash rates ahead of the October Golden Week holidays. Average E
Spot rates to North Europe and Med dropped sharply last week, with the SCFI falling by 13.2% and 14.0% respectively as carriers continued to slash rates at an aggressive pace. Latest market rates surveyed to North Europe ranged from $2,900/feu to $3,500/feu down from $3,400/feu to $4,200/feu a week ago with the 2M and OCEAN Alliance carriers forced to match the aggressive rate cuts by THE Alliance carriers. Although port congestion remains serious across key Chinese and European ports, this ha
US East Coast ports were shut down from 1 October 2024 with ramifications that could be far more serious than all previous port strikes in the US, including the 1971 ILWU strike that lasted 130 days, the 1977 ILA selective strike that lasted for 57 days, the 2002 PMA lockout of the ILWU that lasted for 11 days and the 2014-2015 ILWU work slowdowns that persisted for almost 5 months. Congestion at US East Coast ports has picked up last week ahead of the planned strike, with Savannah, Charleston
Register Free Trial [https://www.linerlytica.com/register/?utm_source=W202440] The US East Coast dockworkers strike will begin on 1 October 2024, throwing the container shipping market into turmoil with significant uncertainty over the duration of the industrial action and lack of US government action to stop the strike. Carriers have done little to deal with the situation, with some of them scrambling to apply port disruption surcharges only at the last minute and ad hoc USEC port omissions wi
Short-covering continue to be the driver moving up prices of the container freight futures as traders close their freight futures positions to rotate to equities. Open interests fell 23% in a week. Main contract ie EC2412 rallied again this morning after have moved up 8% in the previous 2 trading days. Liners are still cutting their freight rates, which on average dropped 5% over the past weekend. The lowest quotation have broken below $3000/FEU with the THE Alliance liners leading the freight
FESCO has launched a new Fesco Intra-Asia Service (FIAS) connecting Port Klang, Ho Chi Minh City, Port Klang with further connections to FESCO's services to Russia via Ho Chi Minh City for northbound connections to Vladivostok and via Port Klang for westbound connections to Novorossiysk and St Petersburg. The service was launched on 17 August 2024 with the 706 teu BOHAI STAR that made 5 roundtrip voyages between Port Klang and Ho Chi Minh City until 24 September 2024 on weekly intervals. A rep
Newly established STF Shipping has launched 3 new China-Russia Far East service since August 2024, taking over CStar Line's services on this route. According to the company, STF stands for Safety, Timeliness and Flexibility and it has established its headoffice in Shanghai, with agency offices in Ningbo, Seoul, Vladivostok and Nakhodka. STF operates 6 containerships of 1,100 teu to 2,200 teu that were all transferred from CStar Line in August 2024, that are deployed on 5 separate services: *
Freight futures for Shanghai-North Europe route continue their rebound today with main contract which is EC2412 up 7% for the day at 10:50, following the broader capital market in China. Average online quotations for Shanghai to North Europe base ports dropped 1% to 8% overnight, with shipments departing in middle of October see the biggest freight rates cut. CMA CGM released first update since 18 Sep that it slashed its quotations by 14%. Maersk took the lead from HMM by offering the lower fr
In the Asia-Europe trade, most freight rates quoted online are still down with Hapag Lloyd making relatively bigger cut than what other liners do. Lowest FAK quotation is $3,382 per FEU from HMM. Utilization for departures on 24th Sep, both TEH services, were above average, supported by THE alliance members' more aggressive pricing. Asia-Europe Head Haul Capacity UtilizationLast Friday, the average quotation given by the liners is about $4,136/FEU, which is consistent with the SCFI (Europe)'
EC freight futures rebounded on 23 September with smaller than expected rate cut by 2M and OCEAN Alliance carrier, with the spillovers from the expected US East Coast dockworkers’ strike scheduled to start on 1 October. EC traders continue rely heavily on surveys of carriers’ FAK rate quotations which dropped by -7% last week (Week 38) compared to the -18% drop in Week 35. However, the EC rates is expected to weaken in the coming week following the 13.9% WoW drop in the SCFIS on 23 September wh