Container lines

“For the remainder of the year, we see a slow but steadily improving market environment, but we recognize that there are still significant geopolitical uncertainties that could influence the market,” said Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of the world’s fifth-largest ocean carrier.

Maersk and IBM have fleshed out their designs for an industrywide blockchain solution – an open-source platform called TradeLens. There are a host of other blockchain initiatives in development, but as one stakeholder noted, they joined the Maresk-IBM venture based on Maersk’s history of innovation and IBM’s technological prowess, which gives the platform a “high probability of success.”

Maersk said it continues to encounter very high bunker prices, which have not been fully compensated for in freight rates.

Like other emerging markets, it is a “bad news, good news,” circumstance for Mexico. The bad: surface transportation and logistics operations are straining to meet shipper demands. The good: Mexico appears to have arrived on the global trade stage, with all key metrics advancing.

OOCL is sounding alarms about the impact of a trade war on international shipping volumes after a strong first half.

Strong US import volume is at the heart of the rise, and there are other signs of strength, but what’s the evaluation of the early move by industry professionals?

The new loop with calls at Antwerp, Dunkirk, Teesport, and Grangemouth will start with weekly sailings every Wednesday (Antwerp) and Thursday (Dunkirk) on Aug 15.

The out-of-gauge cargo — windmilll blades 103 feet long and weighing over 16 tons — was loaded on the Maersk Launceston, voyage 1809, operating as part of the Danish carrier’s Intra-Asia Chennai Express (CHX) Service.

NYK attributed Ocean Network Express’s initial loss to administrative problems resulting from “inefficient employee familiarization with the systems and insufficient preparation for the administrative processes.”

Amid trade tensions, surging economic growth, and surface transportation constraints, this peak season promises to be volatile and challenging for US shippers.

The new regulations require carriers to complete their advanced manifest submissions considerably prior to the vessel’s arrival or departure.

Cosco Shipping Lines was able to contain the damage from last week’s cyber attack to its operations in the Americas, and cargo handling in the United States, Canada, and South America at its marine terminals was largely unaffected because Cosco isolated its internal networks across its global operations.

At mid-2018, nearly every segment of Europe’s supply chain is straining to keep pace with strong container shipping volume growth — particularly barge and inland haulage. The good news is Europe’s impressive trade growth story continues — a welcomed economic rejuvenation.

There is, perhaps, no better evidence to senior management on the necessity of proactive carrier engagement than this: transportation conditions can change quickly in container shipping, and an annual contract with an ocean carrier is no guarantee of capacity when one needs it.

The ongoing uptrend is noteworthy because, historically, the largest increases in spot rates often occur in August, usually the busiest month of the peak shipping season, and October, the last month of the holiday shipping period.

Although trade tensions between the United States and the European Union and their impact have been muted so far in 2018, trade stakeholders know that could change dramatically and quickly.

However, the rising spot rate, while encouraging for ocean carriers as peak season approaches, has not — so far — refuted a perennial concern regarding rates and the second half of the year.

APL’s blockchain aims to include a range of container shipping processes, with an example of the platform’s utility being the elimination of the redundancy, needless rekeying, and back-and-forth of one essential task.

As Cosco continues to guide its customers through email transmissions for the booking of cargo, there was good news on Wednesday.

Since Cosco’s overseas operations have not been affected, communication with US offices is able to take place, although at a slower pace, a key Cosco official said Tuesday.

The exchange is about encouraging carriers and shippers to move past a system driven by uncertainty: beneficial cargo owners face no penalty for booking a certain volume of cargo on a ship, and then failing to send it; and carriers face few consequences for leaving containers on the dock.

Despite strong demand, the Hong Kong-based firm said Friday that increases in material costs, particularly corten steel, accounted for a marginal interim net loss for the first half of 2018, compared with a $16.6 million profit for the same period in 2017.

Geopolitical factors have driven outlook revisions by key container shipping stakeholders.

Amid a slew of low water-level carrier surcharges, the Port of Montreal said concern that its future is limited by its shallow draft is overplayed.

Eastbound trans-Pacific spot rates are mostly holding their strength even as volume growth slows and trade tensions mount.

Could a looming trade war shake up one of the most stable global shipping lanes?

A deal between the port of Santos and pilots will allow more cargo to enter the port and provide carriers with more operational flexibility.

Zim is linking up with the 2M Alliance in a bid to trim costs and capacity on the Asia-US East Coast trade.

A new service from APL will test the hypothesis that shippers will pay more for better service, if it is available.

It’s now an unavoidable fact that the precautions traditionally taken to avoid container ship fires — such as ensuring that stowage plans comply with dangerous goods guidelines and carriers scan bills of lading for keywords indicating the possibility of misdeclared cargoes — are failing to adequately mitigate the risk to crews, cargoes, and ships.

Eastbound Pacific spot rates rose for the second straight week as Cosco and Ocean Alliance partners became the third carrier alliance to announce peak season cuts in services.

Port owner Hutchison Ports said it will continue to work to improve productivity levels at Felixstowe.

Pushing data back to users may very well prove to be the pivotal point at which the container shipping industry shifted en masse to portals. But getting to that step will likely require another cultural shift.

The new Panama Canal’s larger locks appear to have hit the shipping industry at the right time, given at least one, and possibly two, global trends in international trade.

This much is known about rates for US importers from Asia heading into peak season: there are factors that would generate firm-to-higher rates, but also historical factors that would lead to a softening of rates.

The service, if added, would complement existing feeder services by other ocean carriers. A CMA CGM official said the company has held talks about the possible service.

Many experts argue that blockchain technology is tailor-made for container shipping’s international logistics work. But blockchain faces numerous hurdles — the biggest of which may be cultural.

US importers plan to bring in record container volume this peak season, which will translate into an impressive 2018 year-end gain compared with 2017.

Ocean carriers want to avoid being caught up in secondary sanctions that will be imposed by the United States on companies dealing with Iran.

However, far from being an omen of declining demand, headhaul rates from Europe to the United States have strengthened as peak season gets under way.