West Coast Port Congestion - Update 2

Far East to US East Coast
Despite extra loader activity during late January and early February, trade volumes remain very strong and carrier utilizations remain very high, with frequent cases of rollover. Of 10 major carriers we spoke to specifically about the issue, 9 of them confirmed that they are already rolling shipments or will have a roll-pool in place in the next 7 days. We expect the situation to become more severe in the coming 2 weeks. There is thus far no information regarding post-holiday void sailings.

Far East to US West Coast (PSW)
Despite what was seen as a minor breakthrough in the ILWU/PMA negotiations earlier this week when the chassis maintenance issue was reportedly agreed-upon, there are still other issues remaining under discussion and still no master agreement in place. Meanwhile, congestion has become even more severe, and will be compounded as current and forthcoming departures from Asia to PSW are now becoming full with seasonal pre-Chinese New Year bookings. To make matters even worse, congestion-related delays have resulted in several blank sailings which will likely occur right in the midst of the pre-Chinese New Year rush. Please see below:

• G6 will cancel the Week 7 sailings of its CC4 (ETD Feb 9) and CC1 (ETD Feb 12) services respectively, covering Central China (SHA/NBO) to LAX with vessels of combined capacity of 12,800 TEU
• Yang Ming (CKYH) will cancel sailings of its PSW2 service during weeks 8 and 9 (ETD Feb 21 and 28, respectively), covering South China (YTN/HKG) to LAX with vessels of average capacity 6,400 TEU
• China Shipping (O3) has confirmed cancellation of Week 7 sailing of the AAC service, covering North and Central China to LAX with vessels of average capacity 10,000 TEU

* Week 7 will see a combined 22,800 TEU removed from the Asia-PSW trade, representing approximately 11% of the weekly capacity deployed on the Asia-PSW corridor

Far East to US/Canada West Coast (PNW)
Services to the PNW remain very full as well, and recently-strong cargo volumes and the strain they have placed on terminals and rail infrastructure is resulting in longer delays. COSCO is reporting IPI dwell-time delays in Vancouver of up to 3 weeks again, while the G6 has cancelled the Feb 9 sailing of its PA1 service, covering Central China with the PNW (capacity 4,600 TEU). In addition, Yang Ming has indicated that CN and CP railroads are starting to restrict cargo acceptance to IPI destinations from Vancouver as they try to clear backlog.

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