MSC and Maersk, partners in the 2M alliance, said in separate statements this week that service was suspended as previously freight rates had been cut by more than half from their summer peak, while rates on the U.S. East Coast weakened further as the end of 2022 approached.
they will temporarily suspend their jointly operated Liberty / TP23 service until further notice, adding that the suspension "will help ease port congestion". The last flight will depart from Indonesia on November 23. Launched in March 2021, Liberty/TP23 offers service from Indonesia, Vietnam and China to the US ports of Charleston, Savannah and New York-New Jersey with a range of vessel capacity of 8,000 TEU on board.
so far, demand for U.S. East Coast services has remained strong, mainly due to congestion at West Coast ports and concerns about the new West Coast labor agreement.
New York and New Jersey officially overtook Los Angeles as the nation's largest container port in August, with capacity up 10.5 percent to 441,511 TEU compared to last year, while Los Angeles dropped 16.8 percent to 404,513 TEU.
Despite the congestion, sea freight rates have been plummeting over the past few weeks, although not as fast as U. S.-West freight rates have fallen by about 65% to below $7000/FEU compared to 12 months ago, although they are still 50% higher than they were before the epidemic.
But the 2M alliance suspended USEC service trend shows that as rates return to pre-pandemic levels, the supply of ships on the East Coast of the US seems too high to offset the rate decline. In the meantime, more service changes may be coming. MSC's stand-alone Santana service, which moved from the West Coast to the East Coast service last year, will instead run every three weeks instead of once a week, according to people involved. The news remains to be confirmed.
in the latest New York-New Jersey cargo data, October's 792,548 TEUs were comparable to the year-ago period, despite New York-New Jersey being the nation's busiest port for three consecutive months. Full-year sales in New York-New Jersey are expected to be roughly the same in 2022 as in 2021.