Posted on 04/28/2021 5:02:31 AM PDT by blam
The number of container ships stuck at anchor off Los Angeles and Long Beach is down to around 20 per day, from 30 a few months ago. Does this mean the capacity crunch in the trans-Pacific market is finally easing? Absolutely not, warned Nerijus Poskus, vice president of global ocean at freight forwarder Flexport. “It’s not getting better. It’s getting worse,” he told American Shipper in an interview on Monday.
“What I’m seeing is unprecedented. We are seeing a tsunami of freight,” he reported.
“For the month of May, everything on the trans-Pacific is basically sold out. We had one client who needed something loaded in May that was extremely urgent and who was ready to pay $15,000 per container. I couldn’t get it loaded — and we are a growing company that ships a lot of TEUs [twenty-foot equivalent units]. Price doesn’t always even matter anymore.”
Restocking driving volumes higher
Poskus said that trans-Pacific import volumes are still rising. He noted that January trans-Pacific imports were up 10% versus 2019 (comparisons to 2020 numbers are skewed by COVID) and 13.5% in February, then jumped 51% in March. “So, we’re now at 1.5 times pre-pandemic levels.”
With imports far outpacing retail sales growth, he attributed volumes to inventory restocking. “The restocking is actually affecting the trade even more than growth in demand. That tells me that this will last even longer. Let’s say U.S. consumer demand slows down in Q3 and Q4. That’s not expected, but even if it does, [capacity availability and rates] shouldn’t improve quickly, simply because of the huge restocking demand.”
(snip)
(Excerpt) Read more at nationandstate.com ...
He says, Buckle up! May is about to get worse.
Prepper ping
We’ll be seeing a lot of economically motivated adulteration of medicinal products.
If it’s inventory restocking that doesn’t sound too bad.
“You have to be flexible. Look for any routing and be creative. It’s a moving target. And don’t wait. If something opens up, act fast.”
My husband is in the supply chain field. Retailers are coming to understand what indecisiveness gets them is backlog.
Those containers getting unloaded is a huge problem. Prices are going to continue to rise, and demand is going to outpace supply for a while. Then we have inflation to deal with too, because we have overspent.
So better buckle up, buttercup. It’s going to be hard for a few more years.
May, June, July....
It’ll be a new kind of lockdown.
Heard a rumor on Saturday from a supplier of injection molded beehives that prices will go up 50% next year.
All these container ships arriving full from Asia and returning across the Pacific empty. Shows the decline of America.
We are pilling up debt buying everything we can, but that party is going to end soon.
Never heard of the website. Asks for donations, though. Shortage of everything except tin foil, apparently.
blah blah blah
Or has it already ended with the foreigners in control of the government !
The trucks are stopping, or deadheading, while the stuff cannot get out of warehouses. Not enough crew at work to move all the stuff. Artificial scarcity and a flood of fiat money pouring into the economy from government coffers. Tax revenue flat or falling.
The Weimar Republic just before the collapse.
fear porn....
‘Retailers are coming to understand what indecisiveness gets them is backlog.’
indecisiveness-along with piss poor guidance from the medical community...
I realize that I’m bashing the medicos big time on this forum, but, damn it, they were the ones who should have been out in front of the viral mitigation way back when, with firm yet prudent advice about how to deal with a medical crisis, drawing upon the training only they had...but no, they,along with the scurrilous mass media, played right into the hands of the most corrupt people on earth, politicians...
If we had a real president he would declare a national security emergency and send the national guard to these ports where longshoremen are staging a stealth work slow down. IMHO the left is behind this and the intent is further destruction of the economy.
If only we hadn’t shut down the economy in the first place! That will go down in history as the biggest government mistake ever made and it was across the world, not just in the USA.
So better buckle up, buttercup. It’s going to be hard for the rest of our lives. /fixed.
Unless, of course, the stuff inside the trailer is stuff that nobody really wants. Then it’s just extra inventory.
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