Container lines

Holes in the Atlantic port network are being plugged as ONE, the Ocean Alliance and HMM prepare for February’s launch of the new container shipping groupings.

Severe weather and a rush of cargo before Lunar New Year celebrations slow Asian factory production are clogging major ports from Tokyo to Shanghai.

Advent eModal, a three-decade landmark provider of fee collection and appointment scheduling at container terminals, has been sold by private equity group Blackstone to air cargo software specialist CargoSprint.

The facility’s launch customer is known to be Amazon, which will use the strategically located warehouse to provide fulfilment services across the region.

Carrier executives who dominate the board of the United States Maritime Alliance tell the Journal of Commerce they are done with what they consider to be an overly passive approach demonstrated in recent months by USMX staff in the face of repeated provocations by ILA leadership.

Fears that methanol will not be available in the coming years at the scale required to power a growing and thirsty ocean fleet are pushing the order book deeper down the LNG pathway.

The February launch date coincides with the start of services by the Premier Alliance formed by ONE, HMM and Yang Ming.

While carriers can offset some operating costs by raising rate levels, reducing carbon emissions on voyages that are taking two weeks longer is becoming increasingly important as decarbonization regulations tighten.

The Federal Maritime Commission said that it needs more information about the new grouping of ocean carriers known as the Premier Alliance before the vessel-sharing agreement can begin in February on US trades.

The Asia-North America trade will be featured on 13 of the initial 24 services inaugurated by the ONE-HMM-Yang Ming partnership.

Canada’s anti-trust enforcer said laws already on the books adequately cover the liner industry, but it has no ability to police freight rates or service levels.

US maritime regulators are investigating reports that the Spanish government has blocked US-flag Maersk ships carrying military cargoes for Israel from calling Algeciras.

There is no guarantee we will see the same market shifts in early 2025 that we saw during the last big alliance shakeup in 2017, but the operational realities faced by carriers are essentially the same, writes Lars Jensen.

The ocean carrier looks to secure berth slots and yard space ahead of 2025 as container lines and new alliances plan to leverage terminal ownership stakes.

While India-USEC spot rates have steadily dropped from a late-July peak because of the demand downturn and increased capacity, co-loaders have been even more aggressive in adjusting rates downward to reach their slot targets.

Hapag-Lloyd has contracted with a Chinese energy producer for green methanol to power five 10,100-TEU chartered ships with methanol dual-fuel propulsion systems.

The news from Gemini came as MSC released the latest update to its standalone east-west network that will also launch in February.

The agreement was set in motion by Evergreen just weeks after Singapore experienced unprecedented congestion in May and June, with vessel delays of up to 10 days.

NYSHEX is making a renewed effort to solve the fundamental problem of ocean container supply chains, promoting the use of index-linked contracts to build contract integrity and certainty.

Carrier compliance with European regulations targeting the reduction of carbon emissions will increase in 2025, and the rising costs that result will be passed on to customers through higher surcharges, liners say.

Average spot rate levels on the Asia to Europe trade lanes have continued to increase through November as an early start to the Lunar New Year pushes up bookings, forwarders say.

The use cases for sensor-enabled container fleets could expand if shipping lines see such hardware as a legitimate tool to combat the threat of illicit goods movement.

Converting an existing vessel to be able to operate on methanol requires major engineering work and could cost more than building a new ship with a shorter time to depreciate the investment, according to the carrier.

Frontloading and Red Sea diversions pushed volume and rates higher in the third quarter, and ongoing geopolitical disruption will allow carriers to extend their robust financial health into next year, according to the founder of the global equity firm.

A dearth of consolidation means there are still plenty of visibility vendors for shippers to choose from, but it also means the market as a whole is on somewhat unsteady ground.

While there is some frontloading of US imports from China to get ahead of expected tariffs in the coming Trump administration, most cargo owners appear to be holding their fire, writes Journal of Commerce Executive Editor Mark Szakonyi.

NVOs will enter 2025 hoping that their experience this year with carriers taking a get-tough approach to their business dealings was merely cyclical, a product of an unusual market following the Red Sea diversions and an early peak season.

The New York Shipping Exchange’s plan to introduce indexes to support long-term contracts adds to an already crowded field of providers.

The urgent creation of new e-fuel markets for the most scalable net-zero solutions is essential if global cargo owners are to achieve their 2030 and 2040 climate goals, according to ZEMBA.

A lack of action at the government level is now the number one bottleneck facing green corridor projects, according to a new report.

The move comes as the DP World-operated hub is making large investments in berths and supporting infrastructure with a plan to grow its throughput and attract volumes from other UK ports, including top rival Felixstowe.

The order for the 14,000-TEU ships continues the tussle between methanol and liquefied natural gas (LNG) as the preferred fuel for the next generation of container ships.

The carrier, which reported $1 billion in net profit for the third quarter, says the potential boost in volumes could come as US importers seek to beat the possible implementation of new tariffs on Chinese goods by the incoming Trump administration.

While the presidential campaign is no longer a factor, the new Trump administration will likely be similarly disinterested in a strike of any significant length and, it can be assumed, will get directly involved in talks.

The strong quarterly results mirror those of other carriers, including CMA CGM, Yang Ming Marine and Wan Hai Lines, which have also recently reported stellar third-quarter financials.

Both carriers generated more in net income between July and September than the first two quarters combined, filings to the Taiwan stock exchange showed.

While there was no official word as to what caused the flip-flop on the part of the carrier, sources believe the security situation in the Red Sea remains too volatile for carriers to consider returning to the Suez route.

CMA CGM’s group net profit rocketed to $2.7 billion in the third quarter, thanks to stronger pricing power and earlier peak seasons for North American and European importers.

US retailers plan to significantly increase imports in November and December compared with projections from just one month ago following Donald Trump’s election to a second term.

Among the major container lines, CMA CGM has taken the lead in reinstating shorter Suez Canal routings, offering India exporters to North America shorter transits than the majority of other services sailing around southern Africa.