A temporary truce between the US and China. Both countries have announced that duties will be temporary suspended for 90 days.
US tariffs will be reduced from 145% to 30%, while Chinese levies will come down from 125% to 1o%.
The suspension will come into effect on May 14th.
Experts expect traffic flows between the two countries to recover significantly.
The 90-day respite will come to an end in the middle of the usual peak season. It is therefore highly likely that many importers will go ahead with orders right away, trying to acquire as much merchandise as possible before the time window expires. In short, there will be a rush to stock up, which will have a direct effect on the market.
“We should therefore expect a possible pull-forward of cargo creating a shorter, sharper, peak season from basically right now,” explains Vespucci Maritime CEO Lars Jensen.
It is also likely that carriers will cancel many of their blanked sailings they announced over the last few weeks. Just how fast this happens will determine the extent of a possible short-term capacity shortage. This will lead to a more or less dramatic increase in spot rates.
According to Jensen, with the expected increase in cargo, it is probable that the US ports, which are currently facing a massive drop in cargo volumes, will soon find themselves overwhelmed by the hundreds of containers that will arrive over the next three to six weeks, with possible congestion problems and, thus, disruption to the logistics chain.
Translation by Giles Foster