Eyes on the global freight market as ocean bookings plunge

Yesterday I wrote about a forecast for a plunge in US port volumes that would start to hit in May and now Vizion is out with some real-time data showing that ocean bookings for US imports crashed in the week after ‘Liberation Day’ compared to the week before.

In general, a shipment from Shanghai to Los Angeles take 20-30 days, adding another 15 days for transit through the Panama canal to New York.

A report in Sourcing Journal cited Kyle Henderson, CEO and co-founder of Vizion, who highlights a sharp drop in bookings of apparel shipments.

“A low-margin, high-volume Asia-origin business like apparel is
extremely susceptible to the tariff whiplash,” Henderson said. “You can
see the rationale of pause or hold all shipments, because if anything
starts arriving in the country and these tariffs are active, a brand
might now financially be in a tough spot because they now owe a pile of
cash that they’re not prepared to pay.”

This article was written by Adam Button at www.forexlive.com.