US economic growth and its accompanied consumer spending is on the rise – as shown by key indicators followed by BIMCO’s shipping market analyst – and will result in stronger demand for container shipping.
From mid-2020, global container export volumes saw strong growth, and combined with increasing port congestion it caused supply chain challenges and historically high liner operator financial results which have been the norm since. In September 2022, however, container volumes dropped below volumes recorded in the same month in 2019 for the first time since mid-2020 and statistics just released by Container Trade Statistics have confirmed the trend.
During the past eighteen months, a couple of trends seem clear in the freight market for container shipping. Primarily, the demand for imported containerised goods in Europe and US is going up, reflecting the clearly improved economic development. Secondly, the vessels become larger and larger as the quest to lower unit costs is high on the agenda everywhere. Thirdly, the major freight rate volatility is mostly on European-bound containers.
For the first time in exactly half a year – container spot rates out of Shanghai have increased after falling for 25 consecutive weeks. On the last day of 2010 – Shanghai Shipping Exchanged disclosed rising spot rates for all destinations including the main trading lanes going to Europe and US West Coast. Following a 29% drop on average spot rates, the index rose 4% during the 52nd week of 2010.