2019 Container Shipping Outlook

What a year 2018 was for US containerized ocean shippers — and 2019 doesn’t look any less volatile. The pressures, from higher tariffs on US imports and exports to the International Maritime Organization’s low-sulfur fuel mandate on oceangoing ships, are showing little signs of letting up, posing continuing challenges for logistics managers and their transportation providers. On the service side, reliability hit new lows and last fall’s chaotic trans-Pacific peak season frustrated North American importers. The macro outlook isn’t that much more comforting. While the US economy moves from strength to strength, the frequency of warning signs of a slowdown — or worse, recession — are becoming more apparent. Not since the 2008-2009 global financial crisis has there been as much concern on what a US economic deceleration or retraction would do to the global economy — which, outside the US, already is showing malaise ahead of Brexit-related pain and slower Chinese growth.

With trans-Pacific contract negotiations right around the bend, this webcast will provide the insights shippers need regarding the direction of the market, and the path ahead