The Paper reporter Zhang Ruoting
Since the second half of this year, freight rates for all routes in the global container shipping market have continued to soar. In recent months, due to the uneven recovery of the global economy, the sharp resurgence of the epidemic in many parts of the world, and the arrival of traditional peak transportation seasons such as Christmas and New Year, many ports in Europe and the United States have experienced congestion, while many domestic ports are extremely short of containers. Under such circumstances, many large shipping companies have begun to impose congestion surcharges, peak season surcharges, container shortage fees and other surcharges.
Industry analysts told reporters from The Paper that the "price increase" in container shipping is mainly due to the different degrees of economic recovery in various countries around the world after the outbreak of the new coronavirus. The current freight rates are almost at their highest level. As the peak transportation season passes and the global economy recovers, freight rates will fall back.
The Paper reporter learned from the Shanghai Shipping Exchange that the Shanghai Export Container Comprehensive Freight Index released on November 13 was 1857.33 points, an increase of 11.6% from the previous issue. The Shanghai Export Container Settlement Freight Index (SCFIS) newly released by the Shanghai Shipping Exchange on November 2 for the West-West route reached 2376.13, which is more than twice the base index (1000) on June 1 this year.
Economic recovery has varying degrees, and global container shipping capacity is imbalanced
As the epidemic in Europe and the United States heats up, many countries have insufficient production capacity, and China's foreign trade exports have increased rapidly recently.
According to General Administration of Customs data, in the first 10 months of this year, my country's import and export of goods trade increased by 1.1% compared with the same period last year. Among them, exports were 14.33 trillion yuan, an increase of 2.4%. Among export products, textiles including masks were exported in total to 908.41 billion yuan, an increase of 34.8%. In addition to medical and health supplies related to epidemic prevention and control, the export of products related to the "stay at home economy", furniture supplies, daily necessities, etc. also increased significantly. .
Corresponding to the growth situation of my country's foreign trade exports, there is an obvious imbalance in global container shipping capacity resources.
In large ports such as Shanghai, Ningbo , Lianyungang , due to the extreme shortage of containers, shipping capacity has been greatly affected, resulting in delays in ship berthing operations and delayed exports of some goods.
At the same time, ports in the United Kingdom, the United States, New Zealand and other places are very crowded. The UK's Ferriestow Port has announced that it will stop accepting empty containers due to congestion, which has caused containers to spread from the port and distribution center to surrounding cities and rural areas. Industry insiders expect container congestion at UK ports to continue until early 2021.
It is estimated that the number of empty containers in Australian ports exceeds 50,000. In the U.S. market, the online container circulation platform Container xChange reported that the waiting time at West Coast ports is 4 to 5 days, and the problem of containers stranded in ports caused by the shortage of trailers and other supporting facilities and manpower also needs to be solved urgently. Lin Shulai, chief analyst of
html billion Hailan Industry Research Institute, told The Paper that currently, the pace of global economic recovery is uneven, and there are signs of a second outbreak of the epidemic in Europe and the United States. Therefore, China, which is the first to recover, has a large number of industrial products shipped out, but not many industrial products return, which leads to the unsmooth flow of containers around the world."It's not that there's a lack of boxes at the moment, it's just imbalance." Lin Shulai explained that global container shipping was originally a cycle, such as going from China to Singapore , Europe, the Middle East , and then back to China. The process continues. Transshipment of different goods.
However, the outbreak of the epidemic disrupted this "closed loop." "Europe and the United States import a lot of goods from China, but because they are still affected by the epidemic, there is a shortage of manpower and supporting facilities, so empty boxes cannot be released." Lin Shulai said that this is why domestic There will be a situation where "a box is hard to find". In fact, this situation has already occurred since May or June this year.
The imbalance of trade and the "unsmooth" flow of transportation capacity have brought about the inequality of freight rates. According to analysis by industry insiders, the freight rate per large box (40TEU) of goods shipped from the United States to Asia is currently only US$400 to US$500. However, the freight rate per large box of goods shipped from Asia to the West United States is more than US$3,800, and the freight price per large box shipped to the East US is more than US$4,600. Dollar.
Therefore, in order to transport empty containers arriving at European and American ports back to Asia for export as soon as possible, shipping companies have tried their best not to return the goods on the way.
Freight prices are soaring, and shipping companies generally charge surcharges.
Due to the increase in freight rates caused by the imbalance of transport capacity, container shipping companies currently generally charge various surcharges.
When there is a serious shortage of containers, in order to ensure that the goods are delivered on schedule, it is common for shippers to take the initiative to increase prices to obtain guaranteed shipping space from shipping companies. It is reported that the US shipping fee market currently ranges from US$950 to US$1,250 per large box.
In addition to the shipping fee, the reporter learned that shipping companies such as Wanhai, CMA CGM, Mediterranean, and Maersk have all levied surcharges.
0,000 Shipping Lines and others have begun to charge a shortage fee of US$500 per box and US$1,000 per large box for goods shipped from Shenzhen to Southeast Asia; Maersk, Mediterranean Shipping Company and French CMA CGM are shipping goods from East Asia, including Taiwan, China, to New Zealand Containers levied a terminal congestion surcharge of US$200 to US$300; German shipping company Hapag-Lloyd announced that it would raise prices for sailings from East Asia (excluding Japan) to the UK to US$5,190/FEU, and to the western Mediterranean The sailing price has been increased to US$4,710/FEU.
Some analysts told reporters that the container shipping industry is relatively monopolistic. "If one company raises prices, other companies will also increase their prices." However, since shipping companies are subject to antitrust laws and cannot take joint price increases, each company has surcharges with different names and prices. "Various surcharges with clear purposes are actually price increases in disguise."
According to the British Labor Department Shi Daily reported on November 18 that surging demand and freight rates made the international shipping giant Maersk profit about US$1 billion in the third quarter of this year. In the next step, Maersk will focus its business on purchasing containers rather than ships. Meanwhile, despite a strong performance in the third quarter of this year, Maersk remains cautious about the outlook for container demand next year.
CIMC Group recently stated in a survey by investors that the company’s container orders have been scheduled until around the Spring Festival in 2021.
Lin Shulai analyzed to reporters that not all shipping routes currently have the same rate of increase in freight rates. The rate of increase and the rhythm of the increase are different. Routes related to China, such as China-Europe lines and China-Americas lines, have seen larger increases than America-Europe lines. "Because the trade volume on the lines connected to China is significantly larger, companies whose main shipping capacity is on these lines will benefit even more." He said.
Lin Shulai also believes that the current peak season for container shipping, coupled with shipping companies' price hikes, presents a "price increase" for global container shipping. However, in the long term, container shipping is still at a low level among global commodity freight rates and will have little impact on my country and the world's trade and economic recovery.
"The final freight cost will still be passed on to downstream consumers and will not have an impact on my country's foreign trade exports." Lin Shulai said that this phenomenon occurs precisely because our country's economy is recovering and European and American countries are focusing on purchasing from China. The demand is huge. For our country, foreign trade companies may face insufficient shipping capacity in a short period of time, but exports will remain strong for a period of time.
Editor in charge: Li Yuequn
Proofreader: Ding Xiao
