New price hikes may slow ocean spot rate slide – but for how long?
Container spot freight rate indices showed some divergence this week, indicating that recent falls in ...
Photo: © Alexlmx
By Mike Wackett
Ahead of the traditional transpacific annual contract rate negotiating season, there seems no slowing of Asia-US container spot rate erosion.
The failure of ocean carriers to halt the decline by capacity management blank sailing programmes– at the same time counterintuitively heavily discounting short-term rates – has left the transpacific lines exposed to conceding huge reductions in tenders for new contracts commencing in May.
This week saw the Freightos Baltic Exchange (FBX) Asia to US west coast component shed another 4.6%, to $1,181 ...
Comment on this article
Marc Greenberg
February 24, 2023 at 2:35 pmComplete lack of discipline by the ocean liners continues to roil markets. Last year is was the complete lack of reality and a disregard for the customer or the trade that also roiled markets. It is obvious that global oversight of carrier behavior is needed to address such radical market volatility. This “get what you can when you can” attitude swings in two directions and cuts markets like a freshly sharpened knife. When does the shipping community say its enough and institute global regulation to control carrier behavior to stabilize markets. We live in a global village today and these bad actors are running free creating chaotic and undependable markets – not good for business anywhere!