Container Shipping In for a Treat

Port of Long Beach
According to BIMCO’s shipping market analyst, the Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index (CCI) continued to improve in August for the fourth consecutive month as improving business conditions and robust job growth helped boost consumers’ spirits.
Chief Shipping Analyst at BIMCO, Peter Sand, said: “For an economy mainly driven by consumer spending this is good news for shipping – in particular we expect this to positively affect demand for trans-pacific container shipping – but also to increase US East Coast container imports.
“As containerized goods are predominantly consumer products, the improvement in the housing market also contributes to boosting confidence and shipping demand.”
Sand added that BIMCO’s US West Coast import data show a 4.0% increase for loaded containers during the first seven months of 2014 over the same period last year.
“US East Coast improved comparably by 8.8% during the first six months,” Sand went on to say.

Source: BIMCO, August 29, 2014