Surge In Container Shipping Prices.
- 20/02/2023
Surge In Container Shipping Prices.
Shipping container prices have risen due to a classic ‘supply and demand’ squeeze from all directions which could easily be called a ‘perfect storm’ of issues. There is supply restriction in china, there is difficulty moving containers into Europe and the UK.
The Coronavirus outbreak meant that the shipping lines were left with all of their own containers in the wrong locations all across the world. This created a bigger priority for them to deal with.
Over the past year, we have seen a ‘feast or famine’ situation with shipping deliveries from Asia. While the shipping lines have their own containers to move, they aren’t interested in moving new containers instead.
This may last a few months until the lines realise they are short of containers in China and want these one-way new build shipping containers to fill their boats.In the space of a week, we’ve seen many hundreds of containers get gobbled up by the shipping lines and loaded for shipment to Europe.
The Coronavirus pandemic has had many effects on the industry but the main The Coronavirus pandemic has had many effects on the industry but the main one we saw was the total shut down in china Q1 2020, which lead to a major ‘imbalance’ in global container stocks.
As China’s factories began returning to work with demand at a record high, they found themselves short of empty containers because all of the existing empty containers were still stuck in locations such as Europe and the USA, waiting to return to China to get loaded again.
As shipping demand has exploded, any dormant or parked-up vessels that could not find work before the pandemic are being snapped up at record prices. In addition to this, the sudden spike in demand, and the coronavirus itself have caused many localised congestion issues around the world.
Prices will not crash in the short to medium term, and are more likely to ease off slowly over a period of years.
