Asia-Europe freight rates continue to fall

freight rates decrease

Following up on our recent post about sea freight rates fluctuations, the quoted predictions from SeaIntel proved to be correct. The supply-demand imbalance continues and cutting capacity does not help to avoid rate erosion. The latest Shanghai Containerised Freight Index shows that only during the last week freight rates on Asia-North Europe routes fell by 26.7% to $469 per teu and by 32.1% to $449 per teu on Asia-Mediterranean routes. In the beginning of the month GRIs were successfully implemented on these routes, but rates have now plummeted by 57.7% and 59.9% respectively

At the same time, on the Transpacific routes a sharp increase in rates at the beginning of the season did not last for more than a week. Freight rates to the US east coast from Asia plunged by 9.9%, or $313, to $2,846 per teu this week, and those to the US west coast dropped by 7.8%, or $134, to $1,585 per teu.

Those are all good news for shippers but container lines are now trying to address supply-demand crisis by suspending their services or entirely withdrawing the routes. We believe that a qualified advice should be sought in these circumstances to minimize possible impact on supply chain.