Container lines

Spot rates on the Asia-Europe trade plunged 13.3 percent this week to $809 per 20-foot container, the third straight week of heavy declines since the Nov. 1 general rate increases failed to stick, according to the latest reading of the Shanghai Containerised Freight Index (SCFI).

For a single product, the iPhone plays a leading role in Taiwan’s export orders, helping push the key economic indicator to a record $44.9 billion in October on demand for the smartphone and other consumer electronics.

Just days after postponing a surcharge on cargo heading from Asia to U.S. West Coast ports, Mediterranean Shipping Co. today told customers it would impose a surcharge next week to mitigate losses from terminal congestion.

Zim Integrated Shipping Services’ net loss narrowed in the third quarter as the Israeli ocean carrier started to benefit from a $3.4 billion debt restructuring.

CMA CGM will use at least some of its new reefer fleet to serve growing produce trade between countries bordering both the Black Sea and the Mediterranean.

China Shipping said it will launch the first of five 19,100-TEU container ships by end of the month, supplanting Maersk Line as the operator of the world’s largest container vessel.

Ports are set to dominate container shipping strategy with the focus on terminal productivity and capacity expansion, industry analysts said at the JOC Group’s Port Performance Conference Europe in London.

Trans-Pacific carriers only achieved half the general rate increase gain they hoped to via a $600-per FEU hike, Drewry Maritime Research said today.

The new ocean carrier alliances set to launch in 2015 will operate more reliable schedules, removing a major factor behind the congestion that has plagued major container ports this year, marine terminal operators said at the JOC Group’s Port Performance Conference in London today.

As least seven carriers have suspended newly announced port congestion surcharges on cargo heading from Asia to the U.S. West Coast, likely resulting from importer pushback and U.S. regulatory scrutiny.

The Asia-North Europe trade faces a “huge” impact from the influx of more than 50 ultra-large container vessels over the next 15 months, Drewry shipping consultants say.

Crowley Maritime Corp.’s liquefied natural gas services group has won a second multiyear contract to supply containerized, U.S.-sourced LNG to a major pharmaceutical company’s manufacturing plants in Puerto Rico.

Hamburg Süd last week took delivery of the last of three 9,034-TEU ships and christened the second of them in Singapore and deployed it on its service between Asia and the East Coast of South America.

Carriers in the trans-Pacific eastbound trade will follow this week’s announcement of a $1,000 congestion surcharge with a proposed $1,000 per container rate increase to take effect in mid-December.

Multiple container lines operating in the trans-Pacific lane have plans to implement some of the largest port congestion surcharges ever ― up to $1,000 per 40-foot container ― on cargo moving via U.S. West Coast ports, signaling the extent to which carriers are being battered financially by the worst U.S. port congestion in years.

Clarksons, the world’s largest shipbroker, is in talks to acquire its Norwegian rival RS Platou as the consolidation of the maritime services sector gathers pace

Spot rates on the Asia-Europe trade plunged 25 percent this week, the largest ever weekly fall that once again dropped the rate below $1,000 per 20-foot container and removed much of the gains made after the November 1 general rate increase, according to the latest reading of the Shanghai Containerised Freight Index.

Four boats yesterday ambushed the Egyptian Navy patrol boat near the Suez Canal, reigniting concerns about terrorist attacks on container vessels on the 120-mile long waterway.

Maersk Line CEO Soren Skou said today the world’s largest container line will likely order more Triple-E ships over the next six months.

Hanjin Shipping levied a hefty port congestion surcharge on shipments to the West Coast of North America to help combat rising costs due to congestion, one of a handful of new surcharge announcements tied to the gridlock that has affected Southern California since September and which has now spread up the West Coast.

A significant turnaround in the liner segment coupled with tight cost controls helped state-owned Shipping Corporation of India report a modest net profit of Rs. 18.59 crore (about $3 million) in its second fiscal quarter, reversing a $20.13 million loss a year earlier.

Hapag-Lloyd sank into the red in the third quarter on the eve of sealing a merger with CSAV that will create the world’s fourth largest ocean container carrier.

Shippers of trans-Pacific ocean freight trying to avoid crippling West Coast port congestion are turning to air cargo in such numbers that forwarders report prices going “through the roof.”

CSAV, nearing its merger with Hapag-Lloyd, cut its third quarter operating losses by 24 percent year-over-year but still ended the third quarter in the red, the Chilean carrier announced said Wednesday

Tougher Chinese regulations on imported wastepaper shipments helped drive down U.S. containerized exports in September.

The Brazil-U.S. Business Council, which is affiliated with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, has signed a cooperation agreement with the Brazilian National Confederation of Industry to conduct studies on a potential trade agreement and report back to both governments on the results.

Drewry's benchmark spot rate from Hong Kong to Los Angeles lost all pricing gains associated with an Oct. 15 trans-Pacific general rate increase, and will rely on next week's Nov. 15 GRI to make up some ground.

Maersk Line is reviewing the ocean and inland services it provides in the trans-Pacific trade — a notoriously high-cost and unprofitable trade lane for container lines — with an eye to increasing the rates it gets for those services or eliminating those that don’t make money.

The speed at which the oil price fell took Maersk by surprise as bunker fuel dropped $20 in the past month, but Maersk Group CEO Nils Andersen said customers would benefit from the lower prices.

Container ship capacity jumped 250 percent in the past five years in the Asia to West Africa trade, according to a new report from Alphaliner.

Maersk Group Chief Executive Nils Andersen reiterated Tuesday that the 2M vessel-sharing agreement between Maersk and Mediterranean Shipping Co. will launch in January.

The global idle container ship fleet has barely changed over the past two weeks with unemployment still at a four-year low, Alphaliner reports.

Merchandise imports will slow down in November, but probably not soon enough to help West Coast ports dig out of the congestion problems that continue because of operational issues and work slowdowns by the International Longshore and Warehouse Union.

Amid an environment of slowing demand and overcapacity, container lines have unrealized opportunities to improve profit margins by overhauling internal culture and expanding the scope of alliances, according to Boston Consulting Group.

The Panama Canal container shipping route has become the less-popular route for carriers sailing from Asia to the U.S. East Coast for the first time in history, according to new data from Drewry Maritime Research, with more than half of capacity in the trade sailing via the Suez Canal.

China’s exports during October continued to show solid growth compared to the same month last year, but comparisons for November and December are set to be complicated by the chronic over-reporting of mainland exports to Hong Kong late last year to evade currency controls.

United Arab Shipping Co. is expanding its refrigerated container fleet as it targets new business in South America.

Volumes were down in September on the majority of trade lanes leaving Asia, with the exception of lanes to North America and Australia, according to Container Trades Statistics.

Finnlines posted its best quarterly result in eight years and said full-year earnings could be the best since 2000 as it continues to boost cargo volumes in the face of economic uncertainty in its core Baltic Sea market.

Japan’s Parliament gave the green light to a free trade agreement with Australia on Friday, paving the way for the trade pact to take effect early next year.