Europe-Med Rates Edge Up as US Routes Log Second Weekly Decline

Korea's container freight composite held at 4,666 points this week, up just 20 points (0.43%), as gains on Europe-Mediterranean trades barely offset a second straight weekly fall on US routes. The Shanghai Container Freight Index (SCFI) told the same story: 3,681.34 points, a rise of 1.76 points, or 0.05%. Flat, in other words.

The Korea Ocean Business Corporation (KOBC) published the figures on October 27. Its KOBC Container Composite Index (KCCI), released every Monday since July 2022, tracks container freight rates on 13 major routes from Busan Port to the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and nearby regions — China, Japan and Southeast Asia.

KOBC credited carriers themselves for stopping the bleeding. Freight rates avoided further declines because shipping lines pushed through rate increases and managed capacity, keeping the composite index unchanged.

What happened on the US routes?

Both American trades fell again, but the drop narrowed sharply. On a 1-FEU (40-foot container) basis, the US West Coast rate slipped $4 week on week; the East Coast lost $17. Compare that with the prior week's declines of $59 and $119 respectively. The pressure for a steep collapse has eased.

British logistics and shipping specialist media Loadstar offered the mechanism behind it: "In the Americas, cargo volumes are decreasing. Some shipping companies are offering discounted rates to secure market share." The firm added a warning: "If the supply of ship space gradually expands, price competition among shipping companies could intensify again."

So the narrowed decline isn't pure demand recovery. It's carriers defending price levels in a softening volume environment — and that defence holds only as long as capacity stays disciplined.

Why is Europe-Mediterranean different?

European rates recorded a de facto flat trend. Upward momentum slowed even though carriers pushed November rate hikes and expanded service reductions — blank sailings, in plain terms.

The scale of those cancellations is measurable. Global shipping market analysis firm Drewry counted 56 cancelled voyages out of 714 scheduled on major east-west routes through the end of next month. More than half — 54% — sit on routes connecting Asia, Northern Europe and the Mediterranean.

That concentration is no accident. It's where carriers need rates to stick, and where November hike announcements need physical capacity withdrawal behind them to stand any chance.

Can the Middle East route stabilise?

Not soon, according to KOBC. The corporation's analysis: even if passage through the Strait of Hormuz partially recovers amid ongoing Iranian attacks on vessels, ensuring stable regular voyages on the Middle East route will remain difficult.

Carriers are adapting. They are restoring direct maritime transport between Asia and the Middle East by routing through areas outside the strait. But the workaround has a chokepoint of its own. Land transport capacity is too limited to move cargo unloaded at ports outside the strait to final destinations, and those bottlenecks keep gumming up delivery.

For shippers on that corridor, the constraint has simply shifted from sea to land — a cost and reliability problem that ocean rate indices won't fully capture.

What does this change for shippers and forwarders?

On US trades, the practical read is that the freefall has slowed but the direction is still down. If Loadstar is right about expanding space supply, BCOs may find carriers competing harder for cargo again — good for spot buyers, less so for carriers chasing revenue.

On Europe-Med, the fight is over November hikes. With 54% of blanked sailings concentrated on exactly those lanes, carriers have built the withdrawal case; whether shippers accept the increases is the next test.

The near-term trajectory, per the source data, is a market balanced on carrier discipline: flat indices, narrowed US declines, and capacity management — not demand — setting the price direction into November.