Is the container supply chain crisis nearing its end-game?

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To understand the disruption facing the container shipping markets at present, it’s insufficient to simply focus on the vessels themselves. MSI’s latest estimates for containerised trade growth in 2021 were 6%, above fleet growth of 4.5%. A 1.5 percentage point differential between supply and demand is scarcely enough to justify charter rates for an elderly panamax vessel hitting six figures.

Instead, the combination of port congestion, container shortages and wider supply chain disruption has driven supply/demand imbalances to the extent that ...