Markets/Trades

The turmoil at both ends of the Suez and Panama passage have forced containerships to divert from their regular routes, as ships linked to Israeli interests are avoiding the Red Sea passage through the Suez Canal even as some of the neo-panamax ships on the Far East-US East routes are shifting to the Suez route to avoid the congested Panama Canal. While these moves will help to absorb some of the surplus ships, the impact is limited at this stage as it affects less than 2% of the overall fleet.

The rise in the SCFI rates to the US West Coast masks rapidly deteriorating conditions on the route, with utilization levels falling to 81%. The “Express” services have performed poorly including the Zim e-Commerce Express (ZEX) that was only half full on its first 2 sailings following its relaunch in November. Rates to the East Coast are performing better despite a similar drop in capacity utilization, with carriers able to  secure premiums due to the Panama congestion even with transit times

Betting that the Dec 1 GRI may stick and on the hints of the positive SCFI print the Friday before (i.e. 24 Nov) , the CoFIF contracts rallied on strong volume last week. The April and June CoFIF contracts were up 12-19% WoW while the average daily turnover surpassed $1bn last week. The general sentiments among the CoFIF traders: the freight rates already discounted bearish fundamentals while the year end cargo rush and the liners’ incentive to create better sentiment for the annual contracts be

Following the SCFIS’s 8% WoW correction on 20 November, the Asia-North Europe CoFIF forward rates endured consistent selling pressure through last week on relatively thin volume. Open Interests edged up as turnover-to-open interest ratio fell to just 1.2-1.3, a level suggesting the trading volume may be able to sustain at over $650mn a day. Trading in the week ahead remains hazy with the SCFIS dropping a further 4.4% on 27 November while the SCFI rebounded 10.2% last Friday on December GRI hopes

Rates to the US West Coast are slipping quickly as the window for holiday season shipments have closed even for the express e-commerce focused services, with the SCFI spot rates dropping by 4.1% last week. But rates to the East Coast are on firmer ground, with carriers pushing ahead with Panama Canal Surcharges that will kick in from December, with all of the FE-USEC services through the Panama Canal to compete for limited neo-panamax transit slots from January. SCFI spot rates to Europe have

Easing volumes especially to the US West Coast are starting hit spot freight rates with SCFI rates to USWC dropping by 8% last week. Zim’s surprise decision to relaunch the eCommerce Express (ZEX) service has sparked another round of rate cuts which has prompted CMA CGM to reconsider its plan to launch a similar express service in December. USEC rates are holding their ground as carriers continue to raise concerns over the Panama canal transit restrictions (in number of containership passage pe

Following SCFIS’s 31% WoW move on 13 Nov, CoFIF went limit up at the open on the next day (14 Nov) but gave back more than half of the gain. The market went seesaw rest of the week. The CoFIF traders have been holding a view that the SCFIS will be about 750-880 for next year where the spot SCFIS has been swinging between 600 and 850. While the SCFIS seems to track the SCFI with 2 weeks lag but the relation between the two is not linear. SCFI’s Asia Europe rate is expressed in $ per 20’ dry whil

Asia-North Europe forward freight prices on CoFIF edged a bit lower, ignoring the Nov 1 GRI and the on-going correction in the spot market, while the trading volume stabilizes at just below $900m a day. After 55 trading days since launch, the CoFIF has been a surprising success in the liquidity front, which are sustained primarily by the onshore retail traders. As per the exchange, 80% of the trading volume come from qualified retail traders and nearly all trading volume come from onshore pools

The SCFI transpacific rate assessments surged for a second straight week to pass $2,100/feu to the West Coast and $2,400/feu to the East Coast but these rates cannot be sustained in the traditional slack season in November, with spot rates settling into the usual routine of early month hikes followed by mid-month declines. The same pattern will be repeated through November, with capacity rising sharply this month on both WC and EC routes. Forward capacity forecasts for November currently shows a

Asia-North Europe forward freight prices on CoFIF were mostly unchanged last week, with the SCFI spot rate assessment slipping by 1.7% after surging by 32% the week before, while the latest SCFIS recorded a 1.7% increase following the 7.7% gain a week before. The CoFIF is settled on the SCFIS (Shanghai Export Containerized Freight Index based on Settled Rates) which is based on the blended average settled rates determined by the Shanghai Shipping Exchange with a base index of 1,000 as at May 20