Shipping

Trans-Pacific container crunch is about to become even more severe, warns Flexport, with May sailings now effectively sold out.

Liners are paying historically high rates to charter ships and maximize their exposure to the booming freight market.

U.S. importers will be paying a lot more for annual ocean contracts this year, but pricing inflation has eased.

Dry bulk shipping rates are now double to triple five-year averages. Stock prices of dry bulk owners are on the ascent.

Savannah’s record March underscores why it’s investing hundreds of millions on new capacity upgrades.

The Teamsters call it a strike, but it is more of a protest. Still, it did garner support from another union on Wednesday.

U.S. ports just booked their largest import hikes in memory, according to The McCown Report.

Imports into Los Angeles at not slowing down. Can the backlog be cleared before the peak-season swell begins?

More than a third of the crew on the MSC Gayane smuggled cocaine in June 2019. The first prison term has just been handed down.

As cargo shippers struggle, container-vessel companies rake in massive profits. Early signals point to record Q1 results.

Container shipping spot rates haven’t budged from COVID-fueled peaks. Cargo shippers’ hopes for a rate pullback are fading.

Glimmers of hope for the beaten-down tanker sector: more OPEC+ crude production and more long-haul exports from the U.S. to India.

Days after Ever Given backlog was declared cleared, the number of ships waiting to transit the Suez Canal remains high (with video).

Twenty tons of coke was found aboard an MSC ship in 2019. MSC just revealed that it’s spending $100 million more on security in response.

Bad timing: Still-rising cargo demand is coinciding with container-shipping constraints in the wake of the Suez Canal crisis.

‘Bigger is better’ is the mantra of public tanker companies. The just-announced INSW-Diamond S merger is a step in that direction.

Suez Canal accident aftermath: Extensive disruptions are ahead for key Asia-East Coast container shipping services.

The longer the Suez saga continues, the greater the container, tanker and dry bulk shipping impacts. There could be big losers — and winners.

Back in the Aristotle Onassis era, a Suez Canal closure was a tanker game changer. Today, tanker upside from the canal accident is limited.

Fewer options means less competition and less incentive to control costs.

California’s container-ship traffic jam is slightly less jammed but import pressure remains high. One analyst warns the worst may be yet to come.

Ocean carrier ZIM just released record results and confirmed huge gains for contract rates. So why did its stock sink?

Newbuild-to-fleet ratio now 15.3%, up from 9.4% in mid-2020. But orders are not high enough yet to wave red flags.

Deutsche Bank’s Amit Mehrotra on how long import surge could last and upside potential for container, dry bulk and tanker stocks.

Tanker and bulker spot rates can go sub zero — some tanker rates are there now. What do the negative numbers really mean?

Container, dry bulk and tanker stocks push forward. Biggest winner since mid-2020: Danaos, up (this is not a typo) 1,202%.

How does California congestion rank versus 2015 logjam caused by tensions with dockworkers union? It’s not even close: 2021 wins by a long shot.

“As we continue to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, now is the time to accelerate our throughput and growth,” says Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf.

Analysts tally tanker fallout after OPEC+ stuns market with decision to hold the line of production cuts.

If ocean freight rates have legs, analysts see much more room for the secondhand ship values to run — which should, in turn, boost stocks.

Jefferies senior analyst Randy Giveans outlines why it is now a particularly good time to buy container-shipping stocks.

The Sustainable Shipping Initiative’s road map to sustainability includes financial, social and environmental sustainability factors.

Today’s container market chaos underscores the need for enforceable ocean contracts as opposed to loose agreements, argues consultant Tom Craig.

The bosses of public dry bulk shipping companies claim that recent market oddities point to good times ahead.

“American customers will be able to choose to transport their goods using LNG, a new technology that helps to preserve air quality by eliminating almost all atmospheric pollutants,” said CMA CGM CEO Rodolphe Saadé.

Evan Efstathiou discusses why VCs are looking to invest more in maritime just as shipowners are looking to partner more with startups.

Gordon Downes, CEO of New York Shipping Exchange, joins Ocean Audit’s head Steve Ferreira to chat about structural changes in container shipping and the place two-way committed contracts have in the industry.

BIMCO’s Peter Sand discusses whether container shipping’s ‘new normal’ has legs and what’s next for the sector.

Suvrat Joshi joins logistics software-as-a-service platform FarEye as chief product officer.

“Importers are exhausted” and foundation change is necessary, says Flexport’s Sanne Manders.

Globalization isn’t just driven by comparative advantage. It is skewed by subsidies and mispricing of risk, according to author Marc Levinson.

It’s not just small and midsized importers that face massive contract rate hikes. Even the biggest shippers will feel the pain.

AgTC’s Peter Freidmann highlights the hurdles U.S. food exporters confront as they vie for containers to transport their goods.

One of the largest players in public LNG shipping, GasLog Ltd., plans to give up its NYSE listing. Will more shipowners opt to go private?

Crude and product tanker rates are bouncing along the bottom. As one analyst put it, “There’s only one way to go from here.”

Star Bulk and Golden Ocean have recently acquired almost $1 billion in ships between them as they seek more exposure to the dry bulk market.

Cargo shippers hamstrung by the global container shortage should not expect a box building spree in China to come to their rescue.

It’s not just container stocks rising. Shipping stocks are up for everything from bulkers to tankers to gas carriers.

More venture capital flowing to maritime tech startups – and more shipping companies giving those startups a trial run.

Lending a hand includes everything from improving the environment to funding community initiatives to rescuing a skier mauled by a bear.

Here’s a helicopter view courtesy of U.S. Coast Guard of container-ship armada off Los Angeles and Long Beach (WITH VIDEO).

ZIM, newest Wall Street shipping entrant, is riding wave of record-high freight rates. Shares fully recovered from rocky start.

Due to shipping snarl and container congestions, delays in retail inventories will be felt from Christmas through Easter.

Maersk, the world’s largest container carrier, just reported record quarterly results. And its next quarter looks even better.

Long grind ahead for crude tankers: Executives and analysts don’t see recovery until second half — if not later.

California calls on feds to protect exporters. Shipping groups claim California export cure will worsen congestion — including for importers.

Container lines score huge negotiating advantage as spot-rate surge set to persist through annual contract season.

ZIM just completed the first U.S. shipping IPO in over five years. Here’s a look back at shipping’s wild multidecade ride on Wall Street.

Asia-U.S. liner sailings are now being canceled because too many container ships are stuck at anchor off California.

Short of a conflict in the Middle East and its adjacent shipping lanes, it is hard to see a spike in tanker spot rates in the near term.

U.S. ports have seen “month-over-month strength across multiple business segments.”

In Africa, one seafarer is dead and 15 have been kidnapped. Worldwide, more seafarers are being barred from travel as COVID fears rise.

Nearly 700 dockworkers in California have COVID. Hundreds more are out due to quarantines. Pleas for fast-track vaccinations intensify.

Ocean carrier ZIM has hiked its fleet capacity with new charters and is planning to price its New York IPO next week.

This has been the best January for dry bulk shipping rates in a decade. Is this the long-awaited turning point or yet another head fake?

Cortera report shows surge in business spending as the year drew to a close.

Asia-West Coast spot rates are up 173% year on year. Rail and trucking volumes from ports are up double digits.

Higher fuel prices are bad news for box shippers. Higher fuel spreads are good news for owners with scrubber-fitted fleets.

There are more container ships stuck off California than at any time since 2004. What’s behind the pileup? When can it be cleared?

An LNG ship is now earning more than any other vessel in history. Extreme weather in Asia has propelled LNG rates into the stratosphere.

Even after a wave of just-ordered container ships is delivered by yards, cargo shippers are unlikely to see lower freight rates.

A Biden administration teamed with a Democratic Congress should lead to even more stimulus, a recipe for even more container imports.

How surprise Saudi production cuts and escalating Mideast tensions could impact timing of crude-tanker rate recovery.

Like clockwork, liner operators sharply reduce their sailings each year during the Chinese New Year holiday. Not in 2021.

No end date is in sight as the wreckage removal proceeds nearly 16 months after the roll-on/roll-off vessel capsized off the coast of Georgia.

Successful IPO by ZIM would offer investors direct exposure to trans-Pacific freight-rate craziness, but not without risks from debt load.

Asia-U.S. container rates had held firm at a record high since September. Now they’re on the move again — and headed even higher.

A look back at 2020’s shipping roller coaster: how container sector emerged as ‘surprise rock star’ and tankers peaked early, then plunged.

Plenty of distillate molecules to go around plus no collapse in high sulfur reversed all conventional wisdom, Morningstar says

Top 10 lists dominate the end of any year. American Shipper’s Top 10 stories list is voted on throughout the year by readers simply by reading our stories on americanshipper.com. Here are the stories you read the most in 2020.

Drugs valued at more than $411 million are offloaded at Port Everglades, and the new Long Beach bridge shines bright.

Now-pardoned California Republican Duncan Hunter pleaded guilty to misusing campaign funds.

Chances slim for 2021 shipping equity offerings, but a container-liner IPO prospect remains on the table.

Container imports far exceed sales, raising concerns that 2020’s transport binge could lead to a big headache in 2021.

B2B orders can be fulfilled on one site rather than switching to a logistics provider’s platform, Freightos says.

Will your cargo ship arrive on time? Globally, the chances are now 50-50. In the Asia-U.S. container trade, it’s less than one in three.

Container flows into U.S. ports have grown faster over the past three months than they have at any other time in the past decade.

Vaccine distribution won’t delay deliveries of your Honey Baked Ham and toilet paper, says CNBC’s Lori Ann LaRocco.

Ocean carriers toed the line on capacity control in 2020. What does this new normal mean to shippers, yards and leasing companies?

In an interview with FreightWaves, SSI Executive Director Andrew Stephens talks about zero-emission shipping fuel and sustainability challenges.

It’s not just container shipping that’s rolling in profits. LPG tanker rates are hitting new highs on Asian demand for U.S. propane.

The trans-Pacific surge will persist through Q1 and January could see all-time-high container volumes, predicts Flexport’s Nerijus Poskus.

E-documentation initiative establishes data and process standards for bill of lading preparation and issuance.

Container shipping stocks are back to pre-COVID levels whereas many tanker and bulker stocks are down by double-digits year-to-date.

There will be no letup in booming container imports in 2020. The only question now is how long it lasts into 2021.

The pandemic is driving people to drink more. Bulk ocean shipments of wine in flexitanks are up 30% this year.

First, Spire collects the ship-movement data from orbit. Then algorithms use that data to reveal the patterns of global shipping.

Panama Canal congestion is not impeding transits of container ships but it is pumping up spot rates for LNG and LPG carriers.

The total market capitalization of U.S.-listed ocean shipping stocks has plunged 34% in 2020, but there are reasons for hope in 2021.

Hapag-Lloyd and ONE chief executives will lead the “unified voice of liner shipping.”