JOC.com | Container shipping and trade news and analysis

Memphis shippers ask STB to intervene on intermodal congestion

A group of Memphis shippers and truckers want the US Surface Transportation Board to instruct railroads to stop charging storage fees until a chassis shortage is resolved.

US truck freight tonnage rose 8.9 percent in March

Unadjusted US tonnage data from the American Trucking Associations shows freight returned to the highways after a frozen February, propelling truck spot pricing to a new ceiling.

CN looks to break up KCS-CP merger with rival bid

Canadian National’s $33.7 billion bid for Kansas City Southern would provide intermodal shippers some key alternatives to KCS’s proposed merger with Canadian Pacific, and possibly ignite a bidding war.

Digital air freight platform expands with Turkish Cargo signing

The digitalization of air freight is gathering pace with Turkish Airlines, the latest carrier to embrace real-time booking.

Risk-focused visibility sensor maker gets VC backing

PAXAFE, which focuses on reducing cargo underwriting risk through visibility hardware and software, has nabbed funding to build traction in high-risk freight verticals.

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More News & Analysis

US Gulf ports eyeing inland intermodal as Asian import share increases

Port News

New funding, leadership to fuel Roadrunner Freight

Roadrunner Transportation Systems

Kansas City rail terminals overwhelmed with ocean containers

Intermodal Shipping

Southern California terminal veteran takes TraPac helm at pivotal moment

Terminal Operators

THE Alliance’s empty container returns confounding NY-NJ port truckers

Port of New York and New Jersey

Asian container shortage set to intensify into May

Maritime News

SAL, Jumbo launch super-heavy-lift alliance after regulatory approval

Breakbulk Carriers

Record US imports from Asia accelerate even further in March

US Ports

J.B. Hunt increases container order amid heavy demand

J.B. Hunt Transport Services

Partner Content

Five freight best practices learned from a global pandemic

Competitive Chassis Pools Deliver in the Gulf

A Year of Recovery Begins at the Port of Long Beach

Shippers save money, time with automated transportation bidding tools

LTL Trucking Logistics

Essential Reads

Easing import imbalance best hope for US agricultural export relief

Even as containerized agriculture exports have grown every year since 2015 and global commodity prices rise, agriculture exporters won’t find it easier to secure equipment and ocean slot space until the import imbalance eases.

Forwarders launch new services to stay ahead of China-Europe rail demand

Strongly growing volume on China-Europe rail is causing surprisingly few major delays as forwarders find new routes around potential choke points on the network.

TPM21: US shipper demand for dedicated trucking accelerates

Tight truck capacity is a prime reason for the growth of dedicated trucking, but not the only one. Shippers are using dedicated as a tool to influence customers and reshape supply chains.

Depot closure, empty returns snarling NY-NJ port truckers

A storage depot closure near the Port of New York and New Jersey throws light on the efficiency hurdles drayage carriers face when ocean carriers redirect empty containers to other sites.

Rising low-sulfur fuel price could spur scrubber resurgence: BIMCO

Despite the IMO 2020’s sulfur cap, the COVID-19 collapse in oil prices last year made the case for sulfur scrubbers less urgent. But BIMCO said scrubbers now make sense.

JOC Shipping & Logistics Pricing Hub

The pricing data found here allows shippers and transport providers to more accurately benchmark and forecast for their supply chains. The various spot prices and indices are collected from third-party sources and updated weekly, monthly and quarterly, depending on the data set.

Container | US Surface Transport

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Maritime News

Asian container shortage set to intensify into May

Finding an empty container in Shanghai, or any other major Chinese port, is an expensive and

The difficulties in sourcing container equipment in Asia are intensifying, with unrelenting US import demand and choked logistics chains continuing to slow the turnaround of boxes.

Container lines say low-carbon shipping needs more US support

Congress is urged to back the IMO's $5 billion R&D fund for low-carbon fuels. Photo credit: Shutterstock.

Maritime executives tell Congress the US needs to take a greater role in developing low-carbon shipping fuels.

Container shippers face 'new normal' of more balanced capacity

The days where a constant state of carrier overcapacity existed is unlikely to return. Photo credit: Shutterstock.com.

Shippers — big and small — need to re-assess their supply chain strategies for the post-pandemic new normal and find the best balance between transactional costs, and supply chain speed, flexibility, and resilience.

Lessors, carriers send new container orders soaring

Hapag-Lloyd said Wednesday it had ordered 150,000 TEU of dry freight containers at Chinese box makers for delivery this year. Photo credit: Shutterstock.com.

Carriers and shippers have struggled with a shortage of boxes since the middle of last year as port congestion and vessels delays soak up container capacity and delay the return of empty boxes to key export markets.

Trucking News

Trucking Logistics

US truck freight tonnage rose 8.9 percent in March

Spot truckload rates have hit a level where shippers may not be able to pay the amounts requested, DAT’s Ken Adamo says. Photo credit: Shutterstock.com.

Unadjusted US tonnage data from the American Trucking Associations shows freight returned to the highways after a frozen February, propelling truck spot pricing to a new ceiling.

New funding, leadership to fuel Roadrunner Freight

Roadrunner Freight hopes to win back customers with improved service and service guarantees. Photo credit: Roadrunner.

The asset-light, long-haul LTL carrier Roadrunner Freight is pursuing 'enterprise’ shippers as well as 3PLs as it re-engineers its network while focusing on service quality and operating margins.

J.B. Hunt increases container order amid heavy demand

J.B. Hunt is by far the largest domestic container owner in the US, double the fleet size of its nearest competitor, and more than all the US railroad owned containers combined. Photo credit: Ted Tanner/Flickr.

J.B. Hunt will be adding 12,000 new containers in 2021, upping its original order announced in January based on increased shipper demand for intermodal service.

New funding to help short-haul broker Torch meet e-commerce demand

Short-haul loads can be unprofitable for brokers due to fixed costs associated with securing capacity and the difficulty to carve out margin on a smaller invoice. Photo credit: Shutterstock.com.

Torch Logistics will use $3.5 million in seed funding to expand its short-haul truckload brokerage to capitalize on e-commerce demand.

Port News

US Gulf ports eyeing inland intermodal as Asian import share increases

Gulf Coast ports handled 5.4 percent of total US imports from Asia in 2020, up from 5 percent in 2019. Photo credit: Port of Houston Authority.

A new all-water service from Asia will boost the volume of imports flowing into the US Gulf Coast amid an ongoing boom in regional import distribution capacity.

Southern California terminal veteran takes TraPac helm at pivotal moment

The TraPac terminal in the Port of Los Angeles (pictured) is one of two fully-automated terminals on the US West Coast. Photo credit: TraPac.

The new head of TraPac joins the company at a time when terminal operators in Southern California are facing severe congestion driven by near-record container volumes.

THE Alliance’s empty container returns confounding NY-NJ port truckers

Difficulties in returning empty containers to the Port of New York and New Jersey are hurting driver efficiency and adding to shippers’ costs. Photo credit: Shutterstock.

Motor carriers working in the Port of New York and New Jersey say policies put in place by THE Alliance members Hapag-Lloyd, Yang Ming, and Ocean Network Express have made it especially difficult to return empty containers in April.

Record US imports from Asia accelerate even further in March

March marked the ninth consecutive month of record or near-record imports from Asia, an unprecedented streak of import volumes in the eastbound trans-Pacific. Photo caption: Shutterstock.com.

Double- and triple-digit year-over-year increases in imports from Asia at the top US gateways speak to the issues of vessel bunching and congested marine terminals at some of the busiest ports.

Technology News

Technology

Risk-focused visibility sensor maker gets VC backing

PAXAFE, which focuses on reducing cargo underwriting risk through visibility hardware and software, has nabbed funding to build traction in high-risk freight verticals.

Integration provider Chain.io gets VC funding to fuel logistics connectivity

Chain.io provides systems integrations to a range of logistics companies and shippers, helping them connect transportation and rate management tools to other enterprise systems. Photo credit: Shutterstock.com.

Chain.io, which provides logistics companies and shippers with a cloud-based integration platform to better connect the myriad systems they use, has raised $5 million to broaden its reach.

Shipper demand for ocean visibility growing, but slowly: Gartner

Roughly 90 percent of freight visibility spending is still tied to truckload and less-than-truckload (LTL) transportation within a specific geographic region, according to Gartner. Photo credit: Shutterstock.com.

Gartner’s first dissection of the real-time transportation visibility market found project44 and FourKites out in front of rivals, but said the market remains small relative to broader spend on logistics solutions by shippers.

New funding to help short-haul broker Torch meet e-commerce demand

Torch Logistics will use $3.5 million in seed funding to expand its short-haul truckload brokerage to capitalize on e-commerce demand.

Breakbulk News

Breakbulk

SAL, Jumbo launch super-heavy-lift alliance after regulatory approval

SAL’s Trina and Jumbo’s Fairlane at berth at the Port of Hamburg. Credit: SAL Heavy Lift.

German regulators approved an alliance between Jumbo and SAL that concentrates super-heavy-lift capacity in the hands of fewer players as the project market begins to recover from both long-term and pandemic-driven doldrums.

MPV/HL boost from bulk, container vessel congestion won’t last: Drewry

The 31,000 dwt AAL Dalian discharging gas cooling units and refinery components in the US. Phot credit: AAL.

Drewry’s multipurpose index bounced 15 percent and the inaugural Market Sentiment Index has revealed a wary optimism as the MPV sector benefits from container chaos.

Busy breakbulk market will not spur MPV newbuildings