Seatrade-Maritime: Xeneta: ‘What a difference another crisis makes’ for container shipping

Published by Seatrade-Maritime

Speaking on the occasion of the publication of its mid-year market report, Xeneta chief analyst Peter Sand said: “Let’s just keep our fingers crossed that we narrowly avoided an outright energy crisis.”

Sand saved an own goal by adding: “It isn’t a hugely challenging global economy that we’re looking at. But, as always, there are dark clouds on the horizon.”

No sooner had the he delivered the line, the US attacked Iran and the president promised further widespread bombing, with Iran retaliating with missiles of its own, crude oil also sky-rocketed, from a pre-war level of $64/bbl to a less comfortable $78/bbl yesterday, a more than 10% jump in less than a week. And it is still rising.

The rise in oil prices is significant because, as Sand pointed out, when inflation in Europe, the US and other key economies is on its way up, that “eats into the purchasing power of consumers here, there, and everywhere.”

Fleet growth has outpaced container trade growth since 2022, and that is forecast to continue this year at a lower level, around 3% trade growth compared to approximately 5.5% capacity growth. This equation is expected to deteriorate over the next two years as deliveries accelerate to nearly 8% and 11% of the fleet in 2027 and 2028, respectively.

“When you open up the hood and look beneath into the engine [of container trade] some of the cylinders are not operating in the same way as they are elsewhere,” said Sand.

According to Sand, the “Short-term [spot] market is on fire,” and that means there is little interest from owners to recycle vessels, adding to the capacity glut. Fundamentally, this year, next year and in 2028, overcapacity is literally being built into the market, regardless of where demand is.

In the next six months Xeneta believes that spot rates will fall no more than 10%, compared to the Q3 benchmark, while long-term [contract] rates will fall a similar, 8-10% over the same period.

In October 2025, however, Xeneta expected spot rates to fall 25% over the benchmark level.

“If you were a carrier, you were looking at loss-making rates back by the end of February. Now the picture has completely changed,” commented Sand.

Each crisis has a silver lining for container carriers, and the elevated spot ates are likely to remain in the coming weeks, according to Sand,

In part this is because the impact of the Middle East conflict has created ripples far out from its epicentre, said Sand. Essentially there have been twin peaks to the crisis, the first in the initial stages of the Iran conflict where services were realigned and services re-established.

That was followed by the second peak: “We have seen an increased stress level in Southeast Asia and also other Asian hubs and ports that have created operational challenges, impacting services and supply chains way beyond the epicentre in the Middle East,” said Sand.

In effect, spot rates have increased over 50% since 28 February when the US and Israel first attacked Iran; that has transformed carrier fortunes, from heading into loss-making territory back in profitability.

“What a difference another crisis makes,” said Sand.

Barring yet another crisis, the rate support is not expected to last. Ships are being delivered fast and the geopolitical shake up that has characterised Donald Trump’s second term in office is seeing changes to trade.

Chinese exports increased 2.2mn teu, 11.5%, in the first four months of 2026; US imports were down 1% in the same period in 2025 and fell again by 5% this year. Oceania saw a 20% growth in Chinese imports, up from 7% in the same four month period. Other Far Eastern markets increased Chinese imports by 19% and sub-Saharan Africa imported 28% more Chinese goods.

“We know from our data provider for container demand, transportation demand, Container Trade Statistics, that China’s exports were at all-time high in May. And it is going anywhere but North America,” said Sand.