Shipping giants AP Møller-Maersk A/S and Goldman Sachs have warned that a new wave of supply chain bottlenecks could once again sweep the world once China lifts lockdowns and ports reopen.
In order to implement the clearing, Shanghai has implemented a nearly two-month lockdown from the end of March, which has caused port congestion and seriously affected the flow of freight.
Maersk told Asia-Pacific customers that from the statistical data, the epidemic in China seems to be under control, but the impact of epidemic prevention and control will continue to emerge, and it will take some time for it to return to normal. This means that China’s port capacity will soon expand, and routes to the United States may increase at that time, complicating the situation on the western coast of the United States, as the backlog of goods will continue to flow to the western US ports.
Goldman Sachs agreed, warning of a resurgence of port congestion if China suddenly reopened its ports.
Goldman’s measure of weekly port throughput has slipped since Shanghai’s closure, as port congestion eased in the west and east of the U.S., as the number of transatlantic ships sailing from China to the U.S. has dropped significantly.
In addition, weekly data from the Global Container Freight Index showed that 40-foot container freight rates also fell significantly after China entered a state of lockdown. The index is a leading indicator of Chinese port activity and whether the U.S. will be caught in a bottleneck.
Goldman Sachs said that from the perspective of shipping routes, if the freight rate from Chinese ports to the West Coast of the United States increases, it is safe to assume that China is reopening its ports. Once the ports restart operations, freight rates will start to rise, and there may be a large number of U.S. ports in one to two months. The backlog of goods, which means that the port congestion situation may break out before the US midterm elections.
