General

With the rebound of the global economy and the recovery of demand for bulk commodities, shipping rates have continued to rise this year. With the arrival of the US shopping season, retailers’ increasing orders have doubled the pressure on the global supply chain. At present, the freight rate of containers from China to the US has exceeded US$20,000 per 40-foot container, setting a record high.

At the same time, officials from the US Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) issued a statement claiming that “large freighters’ refusal to export goods from the United States may violate US shipping laws”. But no shipping company cares about him.

On the one hand, there are no empty containers waiting in line to go to sea, on the other hand, empty containers go to sea and refuse to carry goods. The key reason for the double sky of Sino-US shipping lies in commercial profits.

Trade surplus widens, Sino-US shipping imbalance

According to data from the General Administration of Customs of China, in November 2020, China's monthly trade surplus reached 75.4 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of 102.9% compared with the data in November 2019, setting the highest growth rate in China in 40 years!

The huge trade surplus has caused orders from all over the world to fly to Chinese factories like snowflakes. Chinese factories working overtime to catch up with orders are basically smashed by money, and a large amount of material resources are continuously shipped from Chinese ports to all over the world.

In addition, the entire overseas is in a state of material shortage, and the demand for materials is far greater than that of China. Several things that China lacks have been banned by the United States. This leads to Europe and the United States needing Chinese things, but China does not need European and American things very much. .

And global trade is inseparable from the large and cheap transportation method of sea transportation. Since 1946, American truck driver Malcolm McLean (1915-2001) has successfully developed and invented container transportation of goods, which is widely used in automobiles, Railway, ship, and aircraft transportation have revolutionized the global transportation industry, greatly reducing transportation costs, and further promoting the global division of labor.

When a large number of huge ships arrived in Europe and America filled with cargo, it was discovered that there were not so many cargoes in Europe and America that needed to be shipped back to China. The freight rate from China to the United States rose and rose, and the freight rate from the United States to China fell and fell. A bunch of sea-going ships spent time in the US ports waiting for the goods to be loaded.

Finally, a sea-going ship found that it had time to wait for the goods here, so it's better to drive the ship back to China as soon as possible to make money. Slowly, more and more sea-going ships voluntarily gave up loading, and the balance between supply and demand has gradually returned.

This led to the incident at the beginning of the article, because everyone went back to China empty, and the American agricultural products could not go to sea because the time for packing is very valuable. Those agricultural products have meager profits, and the affordable sea freight is too low, so low that all the freight costs add up to be less valuable than those days.

American Shipping Company notified American agricultural exporters that they would "prioritize empty containers rather than agricultural exports."

An interview article published by the "Seattle Times" shows that shipping companies will earn more if they ship empty containers to China as soon as possible.

Finally, officials from the US Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) issued a statement claiming that “large freighters’ refusal to export goods from the United States may violate US shipping laws”.

Not only the United States is the case, but the large amount of goods accumulated in China is also in urgent need of export, which has caused many low-value goods to be subject to waiting lists.

A few days ago, the Moments of Friends reported that: some freight forwarding companies have begun to announce that cargo with a value of less than 70,000 US dollars will stop accepting booking services!

Faced with high freight rates, freight forwarding's capital chain is under pressure, and finding a balance between risks and benefits is the current strange situation and a helpless move.

"Golden Week" blank sailing plan-will further push up freight

According to reports, shipping companies are considering launching a new round of blank voyages from Asia around China's 11th Golden Week holiday to support their significant increase in freight rates in the past year.

In the past few weeks, the record high freight rates of major routes across the Pacific Ocean and Asia to Europe showed no signs of retreat. The current closure of Ningbo Meishan Terminal has exacerbated the already scarce shipping space before the National Day holiday and will remain extremely tight.

The booking volume from Asia to the United States is still particularly strong, and BCO and NVOCC are fighting every day for additional shipping space and a few new charters. Jon Monroe, headquartered in JonMonroe Consulting in Washington State, said: “As NVOCCs find it difficult to obtain space, many companies are turning to additional loading vessels and chartering vessels.” According to his statistics, between Asia and the west coast of the United States, “at least There are 4 new chartered vessels in operation", and there are rumors that more companies will charter vessels.

The global freighter congestion! The shipping industry is facing its biggest dilemma in 65 years

Under the impact of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, the disadvantages of backward port infrastructure have been highlighted, and the global shipping industry is facing its biggest dilemma in 65 years. There are currently more than 350 freighters in the world that are jammed at ports, causing delays in delivery and rising prices of goods.

According to the latest data from the signal platform of the Port of Los Angeles on the 16th, there are currently 22 container ships waiting at the Southern California anchorage, 9 ships waiting outside the port, and the total number of waiting ships reaching 31. The ships have to wait at least 12 days to stop. Anchor and unload the cargo on the ship, and then transport them to factories, warehouses and shops across the United States.

According to Vessels Value’s AIS data, there are about 50 container ships berthed near Ningbo-Zhoushan Port.

According to the latest data on the 16th of the German Seaexplorer ship monitoring platform, as many ports on all continents are facing operational interruptions, there are currently 346 freighters trapped outside the ports in the world, more than twice the number earlier this year. Shipping problems caused stock shortages and delayed deliveries. When ships were jammed at sea, there was a gradual shortage of various types of inventory on shore, causing prices to rise. This situation was prominently reflected in the "e-commerce logistics" during the epidemic.

Behind the global shipping imbalance, the most important thing is the trade imbalance, and the global shipping capacity is limited. At the same time, related issues such as the instability of seafarers and the backward port infrastructure have exacerbated the soaring of shipping prices. At present, the solution of these problems is not a matter of a moment. It is still necessary to make a good judgment and book the space in time to avoid There was a delivery problem.