A chaotic regulatory environment is exacerbating a downward cycle in shipping. The industry faces a seesaw of regulatory and governmental pressures, ranging from tariff volatility and fees on Chinese vessels calling on US ports to inconsistent decarbonization policy at the global level. What appears as progress in one area often collides with confusion in another, leaving shippers, carriers and intermediaries sailing blindly through the regulatory landscape.
The recent ruling by the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in the World Shipping Council’s challenge to the Federal Maritime Commission’s (FMC’s) demurrage and detention billing rule underscores this unpredictability. In finding the FMC’s exclusion of motor carriers from direct billing “arbitrary and capricious,” the court reaffirmed a simple but critical principle: regulatory policy must be grounded in its own logic. The policy was flawed from the start, but it required legal action to remedy it. There is also another FMC-related matter before that court, in which an ocean carrier and trucker are debating whether D&D can be charged for days when the terminal is closed.
Relying on litigation to create the certainty needed for long-term investment and sound business decisions is an unstable foundation. True stability can only come from predictable, consistent and rational regulatory frameworks, not from a patchwork of court decisions or reactive changes by the executive branch.
Certainty is never guaranteed, but the current instability shows no sign of abating before 2026. The industry should, in fact, brace for further litigation and heightened uncertainty, as likely forthcoming FMC rulemaking threatens to reshape how shipping and logistics companies conduct business. These factors compound the cost pressures already intensified by rising tariffs. In a business founded on efficiency, we are sailing in the wrong direction.