The humble container has become an expensive commodity in the United States
The humble container has become an expensive commodity in the United States
In January 2020, the shipping price of a 40-foot container from ningbo Port in China to Los Angeles in the United States is more than $1,000.
On August 2, 2021, that price rose to $16,000.
On August 15, 2021, the price passed $20,000.
How ridiculous is that?
At these rates, a sea - going ship can earn its price in just one trip.
And one shipper, scheduled to travel from Shanghai to Los Angeles in September, has already received a quote of $25,000 per box.
"It's a serious offer," he told reporters.
From more than 1,000 US dollars to more than 20,000 US dollars, only a year and a half later, the sea freight prices almost a day, crazy soaring.
I'm looking for a shipping price news for Europe to give you a sense of how fast prices are soaring.
But the skyrocketing freight rate only applies to one-way freight from China to the United States and China to Europe, not the return freight.
The reason is simple: the epidemic has severely disrupted the production order of the world, resulting in a large-scale shortage of materials, and the only place in the world that can work normally is China.
The overseas outbreak started in the third quarter of 2020 and has not improved since.
China's monthly trade surplus reached us $75.4 billion in November 2020, up 102.9 percent from November 2019, the highest growth rate for China in 40 years, according to China's General Administration of Customs.
China's surplus, which Trump is trying so hard to suppress, has exploded.
Notably, this surplus does not refer to trade between China and the United States, but to the total surplus of trade between China and the world.
This huge surplus creates two problems.
First of all, orders from all over the world are flying to Chinese factories like snowflakes. Chinese factories are working overtime to catch orders, which are basically thrown into confusion by money. A large amount of materials are continuously shipped from Chinese ports to all parts of the world.
In addition, the whole overseas is in a state of material shortage. The demand for materials is far greater than that of China. Several things that China lacks are banned by the United States, which leads to the need of Europe and the United States for Things from China, but China does not need much of those from Europe and the United States.
As a result, a large number of huge ships loaded with goods arrived in Europe and the United States, and found a serious problem, that the whole Of Europe and the United States did not have enough goods to carry back to China.
We can't go back to China empty.
So, the shipping companies cut prices like crazy, they would ship anything back, anything to get my ship back to China.
As a result, the price of shipping from the US to China is a fraction of the price of shipping from China to the US.
But no matter how much you cut the price, there's only so much, and eventually a ship has to go home empty.
Which ship should go back to China empty, burning fuel for nothing?
Freight rates from China to the United States went up and up, and prices from the United States to China went down and down, and a bunch of ships sat idle at American ports, waiting for their cargo to be loaded.
