Overview

• The Port of Los Angeles predicts a 32.8% year-over-year drop in container volume for the week of May 4–10, with Long Beach anticipating a 44% decline in vessel calls.
• Global container shipping is expected to contract by 1% in 2025, driven by U.S. trade policies, including 145% tariffs on Chinese imports and a 10% blanket tariff on goods from most other countries.
• Hapag-Lloyd reports a 30% cancellation rate for China-to-U.S. shipments, while Sea-Intelligence estimates that 28% of weekly cargo capacity on the Asia-to-U.S. West Coast route will be blanked in late April and early May.
• Shippers are diversifying routes to East Coast, Canadian, and Southeast Asian ports, with increased bookings from Thailand and Cambodia offsetting some of the decline in China-U.S. trade.
• The ripple effects of declining West Coast port volumes are impacting trucking, rail intermodal services, and warehousing, with Union Pacific forecasting reduced intermodal traffic and Prologis reporting increased inventory stockpiling.