100 ships across LA/LB ports, freight rates zoom across intra-Asia trades

January 20, 2022: With no signs of easing, total container ships backed up across Los Angeles/Long Beach ports touched 100 on Wednesday, January 19, 2022, according to data from Captain J. Kipling (Kip) Louttit, executive director, Marine Exchange of Southern California & Vessel Traffic Service Los Angeles and Long Beach San Pedro, CA.

The 100 total container ships backed up includes seven container ships at anchor or loitering inside 40 miles from the ports of LA and LB and 93 slow speed steaming or loitering outside the Safety and Air Quality Area.

Among most global trades, intra-Asian rates have seen considerable increases in recent times though the costs on the world’s busiest container trade have not risen as quickly as in other places, Xeneta said in its weekly update.

"In the first half of January, spot rates from the main Chinese ports to the main Japanese and South Korean ports have risen back above $1,800/FEU. This comes after spot rates on this trade had been mostly flat in 2021 at $1, 400 (up from an average of $640 in 2020)."

Considering that many of the goods on these intra-Asian trades are intermediate goods moving between factories in the region, doubling spot freight rates can often add considerable costs to the manufacturing process, forcing manufacturers to reconsider their manufacturing and supply chains across the region, Xeneta added.

Asia-US West Coast prices increased four percent during the week to $15,171/FEU, which is 248 percent higher than the same time last year, Freightos said in its weekly update.

Asia-US East Coast prices (FBX03 Daily) dipped 4% to $16,837/FEU, and are 184% higher than rates for this week last year.

“This week all eyes were on China and the impact that strict outbreak containment measures might have on logistics. Steps were taken to quash the spread of positive cases detected in multiple places including Beijing, Shenzhen, Tianjin, Dalian and several others while freight operations in Ningbo largely recovered.”

One reason logistics operations have remained largely intact, Freightos says, is that the restrictions have been swift and as targeted as possible. "Also, so far there haven’t been positive cases among port workers themselves, which was the case last summer when the port of Yantian was partially closed."