Markets/Trades

The Red Sea crisis continues to drive the container market as the number of ships diverted to the Cape route hit a fresh high with no signs of abating. This will continue to create a capacity shortage across all routes, with the Cape diversions and incremental capacity needed to connect to Red Sea and Med ports already soaking up more than 7% of the global containership fleet. Freight rates retained most of the January gains, with the SCFI shedding only 5.8% of its pre-Chinese New Year peak whil

Asia-North Europe forward rate contracts on Shanghai’s CoFIF has traded at a discount of over 50% to the spot rate for over a month and last week’s SCFI drop triggered a further 4% decline in the CoFIF rates on 26 February. The drop has been widely anticipated after CoFIF’s April contracts edged up 4% on 19 February, the first trading day after the Chinese New Year holidays but quickly qave up the gains the next day before flat-lining for rest of the week on relatively low turnover with traders

The number of containerships diverted from the Suez to the Cape route has rebounded to a record high of 403 units for 5.14m TEU as at 25 February 2024. The recent surge was partly due to CMA CGM’s decision to reroute from the Red Sea since 1 February 2024 even though the French carrier has backtracked since then with the 16,022 teu CMA CGM JULES VERNE making an eastbound Red Sea passage last week, with a second ship (the 14,414 teu CMA CGM T. ROOSEVELT) scheduled to follow later this week despit

There were no SCFI and CCFI publication last week due to the Chinese holidays but the WCI, Platts and FBX showed transpacific rates are largely holding to their pre-holiday gains. Smaller carriers such as Zim and Yang Ming have carried over their lower rates on offer, along with Maersk who has continued to push out preferential rates on selected sailings but the majority of the carriers have not slashed their spot rates knowing it will not generate additional bookings during the post-holiday sl

The CoFIF end April forward contracts (EC2404) closed 4% higher on 19 February 2024 on lower trading volumes after the 11 day break for the Chinese New Year holidays. Although the latest SCFIS Asia-North Europe index dropped 3.5% compared to their pre-holiday levels to 3,246, it remains at a significant premium of current forward levels with EC2404 closing at 2,190. Traders are still digesting the impact of continued tensions in the Red Sea and the freight rates development over the last two we

Transpacific eastbound container volumes have rebounded by 16.9% in January 2024 and full year volumes are expected to record positive growth again after falling by 15.1% last year. Transpacific carriers have been able to take advantage of the strong cargo rebound with freight rates more than 200% higher compared to last year. The Top 3 carriers (COSCO, CMA CGM and Evergreen) have managed to retain their positions in January, and all 3 are members of the OCEAN Alliance who are poised  to stren

Charter rates have continued to firm, Linerlytica’s charter rate index has risen by 27% since the Red Sea diversions started in mid-December and current rates are 65% higher than the 2019 average. Despite of bearish earning guidance in its annual report, Maersk has been particularly active in the charter market over the last 4 weeks and have accounted for up to 1/3 of recent fixtures as charter rates continued to firm up with activity continuing to be high heading into the Chinese New Year. Cha

Transpacific rates eased after 10 consecutive weekly gains that saw spot rates surge by over 200%. Rates to the West Coast dropped below $5,000/feu but are still holding at healthy levels compared to the $1,200-1,300/feu rates that were prevalent in the same period last year. Rates to the East Coast also dropped below $6,500/feu bit is also well above the $2,400-2,600/feu rates from last year. Capacity to both West Coast and East Coast will remain tight in March, with only smaller carriers li

Demand for vessels remain strong ahead of the Chinese New Year holidays with charter rates continuing to firm up across all size sectors. COSCO has been particularly active in recent weeks, with renewals on existing charters while taking on additional fixtures including a few deals for delivery taking place only in the 2nd half of 2024. COSCO renewed 2 sets of 8,000 teu and 9,000 teu units from Seamax and Costamare respectively on firm rates for 2 years and have been linked to 2 more deals for 6

Total containership capacity deployed on Asia to Europe routes have surged to a record high of 6.44m teu, up 23.3% compared to the same time last year. The surge is due entirely to diversion from the Suez to the Cape route since December 2023, with over 700,000 teu of additional capacity added to the trade in the last 2 months alone. 55% of the additional capacity has been absorbed in the FE-Med trades where transit times have increased by 10 days to the West Med and 18 days to the East Med whil