In December 2023, major shipping companies around the world successively announced the suspension of the Red Sea routes, and the Red Sea shipping crisis caused a sharp rise in freight rates.
With the detour of shipping companies and the continuous repair of cargo transportation expectations, the freight rates of major routes around the world continued to fall in the first quarter of 2024.
In terms of freight rates, the freight market is in the off-season after the Spring Festival, and the Shanghai Container Export Freight Index (SCFI) freight index has fallen for seven consecutive weeks.
By route, the freight rates of major routes from Shanghai to Europe, the West of the United States and the East of the United States were in a state of decline in March after rising rapidly in January.
The latest SCFI index as of March 29 shows that even with the support of the rise of the Asia-Europe line and the Mediterranean line, the current SCFl index fell slightly to 1730.98 points, with a weekly decline of 0.09%.
In terms of capacity deployment, the global container capacity deployment increased in March due to the impact of the Red Sea crisis forcing ships to make a detour.Among them, the European line deployed an average weekly capacity of 449,000 TEU/day in March, which was +4.65% month-on-month compared with February.
According to the data of Ship Shibao, as of March 27, 2024, the total number of container detours on the European route was 249, accounting for more than 75%. The escalation of geopolitical conflicts has weakened the upward driver of freight rates.
In terms of the shift rate, the transportation market entered the off-season for freight in March, and the vast majority of shipping companies have reached the corner of good hope, and the flight rate of European ports has rebounded slightly.
According to Clarksons, as of March 25, 2024, the global container ship port index was 30.0%, slightly higher than February 2024.
In terms of waiting time, as of March 24, the average waiting time of global container ships (8000TEU+, 7dma) was 7.5 hours, an increase of 1.85 hours compared with the end of February, and the standard flight rate of basic ports in Europe and the United States increased compared with last month.
In terms of foreign trade import and export, in March 2024, the General Administration of Customs released China's import and export data for January-February.
Denominated in US dollars, China's total import and export value from January to February was $9308 billion, the highest value since the data was released; exports were 528.01 billion US dollars, up 7.1% year-on-year; imports were 402.85 billion US dollars, up 3.5% year-on-year.
From the product point of view, the export of mechanical and electrical products rose across the board, the export of labor-intensive products continued to grow, and the price factor continued to drag on the export growth rate; the import of primary products continued to grow high, and the import of high-tech products accelerated.
Source: Souhang Network
