"The current skyrocketing is not in recent years, but hasn't been seen since mankind entered the era of great voyage!"

  Having been in foreign trade for many years, Li Lin, the head of an international freight forwarding company in Zhejiang, was rather helpless at the unprecedented surge in shipping prices.

Under the erosion of profits, the rising risk of receipts and payments has greatly tested the financial strength and psychological endurance of freight forwarders.

  The skyrocketing freight rates and the "hard-to-find" container and space, together with the sharp increase in raw material prices and the RMB exchange rate, have become an annoyance for foreign traders in the "off-season but not weak" and historic peak seasons.

Extreme stories are constantly being staged, breaking records and reminding people that no one is an island.

  The sky-high rent of $100,000 breaks a record

  As a long-term observer in the field of international shipping, Chen Yang, editor-in-chief of Xinde Maritime Network, a professional shipping information consulting platform, told China Business News that since the second half of last year, the tension in the container supply chain has not improved significantly. Soaring state.

  He mentioned an extreme case: Recently, a traditional Panamax container ship that no one wanted received a rent of US$100,000 per day, but before that, its regular rent was only US$2,000 to US$3,000, which is equivalent to a skyrocketing rent. Nearly 50 times.

  Behind the extreme cases, there is a special reason why this freight forwarding company is very urgent for the goods.

But generally speaking, the tight supply of shipping capacity has caused the rents of ships and containers to rise to historically high levels.

  According to the chart of the Baltic Freight Index (FBX), after a slight price correction at the end of February this year, the global container freight index has risen all the way from April 30, from US$4,375 to US$5,443 on June 4, within 35 days. The increase was close to 25%, and the increase reached 5% on the 4th.

Compared with the USD 1,556 on June 5, 2020, the index is equivalent to a year-on-year increase of 2.5 times.

  According to data provided by Clarkson, an international shipping research organization, the current average rental rate of 4,400 TEU container ships is 55,000 US dollars per day, more than twice the rate at the end of 2020.

  According to the latest data of Long-Term XSI, the contract freight index under Xeneta, the global benchmark index is currently 34.5% higher than that at the beginning of 2021, a year-on-year increase of about 33.5%.

The index concentrates the freight rates of leading freight companies and freight forwarders.

At the same time, all major routes have seen growth, and the growth rate of Far East export and European import routes has exceeded 50% on average.

  "Our cargo is mainly from Ningbo Port to Los Angeles Port or Boracay. The freight rate of a high-container container has risen from US$2,000 last year to US$11,000, which is nearly five times higher." Ai, Shipping Manager of Youhe (Yiwu) Trading Co., Ltd. Liz told China Business News, “Almost every company in Ningbo Port is issuing warnings about the available containers. Even if there are spaces, there are no boxes. This is indeed a headache for us.”

  She said that according to the usual practice, the next June to September should be when the company’s shipments are the largest. Seasonal products and holiday products will be concentrated in this period. Therefore, even if the freight is rising, "the replenishment should still be replenishment ".

  "As long as the customer compares the price and hesitates, the cabin may not be available." Li Lin told Yicai.com that the freight forwarding company's profits are not enough to pay interest. "The freight to West Africa is $14,000, but we can't add $50 in profit." .

  Another challenge brought about by the skyrocketing shipping charges is that the speed of customer payments has slowed down significantly, which also exposes Li Lin and them to increasing risk of collection and payment and financial pressure.

  "The rise will not be seen this year"

  "As soon as the Suez Canal was blocked and the epidemic in India became more severe, everything became more difficult." Song Qing, a staff member of an international freight forwarding company in Shanghai, is still busy at work.

  In Chen Yang’s view, there are many reasons for the skyrocketing of container shipping prices. After a slight correction at the end of February this year, the price has risen again recently, mainly due to the impact of the epidemic in Guangzhou and Shenzhen, as well as the Suez Canal incident, as well as overseas. The efficiency of the port has not improved.

A factor that continues to influence is that import demand in the United States and other places is still very strong, and the market in most regions has been oversold.

  Data from the US Census Bureau in February showed that the retail inventory-to-sales ratio fell to 1.23, which was 18% lower than the data in March 2019, and the second lowest in history.

At the same time, U.S. Customs data also stated that U.S. imports are still growing.

  According to data released by the General Administration of Customs on June 7, my country's total import and export value, export and import data continued to maintain double-digit rapid growth in the first five months of this year.

  "At the beginning of this year, there were analysis and forecasts that the shipping price would be stable in the third quarter of this year, but now the industry's view is not so optimistic." Chen Yang said that the current gradually unified view is that this kind of rise At least until 2021 or even 2022, "don't hope there will be a sharp drop this year anyway."

  The still strong global demand for consumer goods and China's strengthening status as the "world factory" under the epidemic will allow the congestion caused by the single-line export of Chinese products to supply the world to continue.

  Chen Yang said that the current market is not only in short supply of containers, but also no ships are available.

On the one hand, the containers cannot be shipped back to China in time; on the other hand, the production cycle of ships is generally as long as 2 years.

  According to CCTV reports, between 10,000 and 15,000 containers are stranded in California, and the number of empty containers in various ports in Australia has exceeded 50,000.

The stock of empty containers in some important international ports is three times the normal level.

  CIMC Chairman Mai Boliang said that there are more than 40 million containers in operation worldwide. Even though the number of containers produced by the group per month has doubled to 400,000, it still produces 5 million containers a year. If we can't come back, we still can't solve the fundamental problem."

  "From the second half of 2020 to this year, shipyards in China and South Korea have received a large number of orders for container ships. However, shipbuilding requires a cycle, which is far from satisfying the near thirst." Chen Yang said that these ships will not be built until at least 2022 to 2023. , So even if there is a rapid increase in containers, no ships are available.

  Since the trend cannot be changed, companies in China's supply chain are still trying their best to deal with the challenges in the face of the challenges that have almost become the "new normal".

  Alice said that the company will increase the capacity of containers in various ways to reduce the demand for the number of containers.

They used to pack the cabinets according to pallets. One cabinet is about 50 cubic meters. Now they are replaced with floor-mounted, that is, tiled, which can increase the capacity of each cabinet to 67 cubic meters, which is equivalent to an increase of about 30%. Space.

As the volume that can be loaded increases, the space required by the company is naturally reduced by about 30%, reducing transportation costs.

  However, the price of this is that after the goods are shipped overseas, when they are unloaded to the warehouse, the goods that could have been transported by forklifts have to be moved out manually, which requires more labor costs.

Alice estimates that labor costs and time will be nearly 10 times higher.

  In Li Lin's view, now is a good time for export to import.

During the period when the renminbi appreciated sharply, imports showed huge advantages and business opportunities.

However, since the domestic domestic sales network still needs time to expand, this is more of their direction.

  Author: Miao Qi