More Blank Sailing from China

Ocean carriers plan to cancel 50 voyages from now till end of April, amounting to 443,000 TEU in trans-Pacific capacity that will be blanked. This signals the decline in Chinese imports to US. Last February showed a 40% decline from year over year comparison. Blanked sailing doesn't mean less containers, as carriers are still stopping at other major Asian ports. As fleets are gearing to get larger, there will be more blank sailing to off-set the decline in imports from China. Shippers and retailers still have high inventory volumes that explains the slowing phenomena in imports from China.

Source: JOC