News
Imports at the U.S.'s major retail container ports have set another new record, reaching 2 million containers in a single month for the first time as retailers continued to bring merchandise into the country ahead of a now-postponed increase in tariffs on goods from China, according to the monthly Global Port Tracker report released by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates.
U.S. ports covered by Global Port Tracker handled 2.04 million TEUs in October, the latest month for which after-the-fact numbers are available. That was up 9 percent from September and up 13.6 percent year-over-year.
The October number was the highest for a single month since Global Port Tracker began counting cargo in 2000, topping the previous record of 1.9 million TEUs set in July, which in turn had beat a record of 1.83 million TEUs set in August 2017.
November was estimated at 2.01 million TEUs, a 14 percent year-over-year increase that would have been a new record if not for the October number. December – normally a slow month with holiday merchandise already on the shelves – is forecast at 1.83 million TEUs, up 6.1 percent year-over year. Those numbers would bring 2018 to a total of 21.8 million TEUs, an increase of 6.5 percent over last year’s record 20.5 million TEUs.
January 2019 is forecast at 1.72 million TEUs, down 2.1 percent from January 2018; February at 1.67 million TEUs, down 1 percent year-over-year; March at 1.57 million TEUs, up 1.7 percent, and April at 1.7 million TEUs, up 3.7 percent.
