Drewry container index continues to rise

With U-Freight’s strong presence in the global container shipping arena, we note that Drewry’s World Container Index rose a further 41% to USD 3,527 per 40ft box on average in the last week.

That means the WCI has increased 70% in the last 4 weeks, as President Donald Trump’s “pause” on import tariffs led to a resumption of US-bound traffic after the initial collapse of transpacific volumes.

Freight rates from Shanghai to Los Angeles have jumped 57% to USD5,876 per 40ft container in the past week and 117% since 8 May (four weeks ago). Spot rates to New York have risen 39% in the past week and 96% in the past four weeks.

Freight rates from Shanghai to Rotterdam and Genoa have also risen in the past week, by 32% and 38%, respectively.

The latest sudden, short-term strengthening in the supply-demand balance in global container shipping has reversed the trend of declining rates, which had started in January.

However, Drewry’s Container Forecaster expects the supply-demand balance to weaken again in the second half, which will cause spot rates to decline again in the second half of this year.

The volatility and timing of rate changes will depend on the outcome of legal challenges to Trump’s tariffs and on capacity changes related to the introduction of the US penalties on Chinese ships, which are uncertain.

For many years, Drewry’s WCI has been the go-to, independent, global reference for index-linked contracts.

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