Drewry said in a latest report that the freight rates of east-west routes in the container shipping market are showing a free fall trend. Due to the imbalance of supply and demand, it is expected that the freight rates of this route will continue to be under pressure for at least two years in the future. Stijn Rubens, senior consultant at Drewry, said that freight rates are expected to continue to fluctuate and become worse in the next two years. The decline in freight rates on east-west routes is the direct cause of the decline in freight index.
The freight index of the east-west route in May 2015 was US$1555/FEU, a decrease of 31.6% from January. According to Reuters, due to the drop in spot market freight rates, which is dragging down the contract freight rates, some shippers require carriers to renew the freight rate. Sign the contract to shorten the scissors gap between the spot market freight rate and the contract freight rate. In the third-quarter freight rate forecast to be released at the end of June, Drewry is still not optimistic about the trend of freight rates and believes that the downward trend will continue. Martin Dixon, Drewry's research director, explained that this was because the ship was launched and the carriers would adopt price measures.
Drewry said that given that the delivery of new ships will continue to increase, especially the delivery of large ships, the imbalance between supply and demand in the consolidation market will not improve at least until 2018. Drewry also said that in order to ensure that the new ships are not empty, each liner company will have to adopt the only means of lowering the freight rate. It is expected that in the second half of 2015, the market freight rate will fluctuate intensified. Drewry said that the downturn in freight rates appears to be beneficial to cargo owners, but in essence it reduces the choice of shippers because carriers will take measures to suspend shipping. To avoid risks, cargo owners’ options include signing a long-term contract or linking the freight rate with an external index.
来源:JOC
