News
Following a record year during 2020, imports at the U.S.'s largest retail container ports are expected to set new monthly records from now into the summer as the nation's economy continues to recover from the pandemic, according to the monthly Global Port Tracker report released by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates.
Retail sales during the November-December holiday season in 2020 hit a record$789.4 billion, up 8.3 percent from 2019, and preliminary figures show retail sales for all of 2020 were up 6.8 percent year-over-year.
U.S. ports covered by Global Port Tracker handled 2.11 million TEUs in December, the latest month for which final numbers are available. That was up 0.2 percent from November and up 22.3 percent year-over-year.
That brought 2020 to a total of 22 million TEUs, up 1.9 percent from 2019's 21.6 million TEUs and beating the previous record of 21.8 million TEUs recorded in 2018.
January results aren't available yet but the month was projected at 2.08 million TEUs, which would be up 14.6 percent over the same month last year and the busiest January since NRF began tracking imports in 2002, topping 1.89 million TEUs in January 2019.
February is forecast at 1.91 million TEUs, up 26.3 percent year-over-year. March is forecast at 1.93 million TEUs, up an unprecedented 41 percent from March 2020, when factories in China failed to reopen because of the coronavirus. April is forecast at 1.82 million TEUs, up 13.3 percent year-over-year; May at 1.9 million TEUs, up 23.8 percent, and June also at 1.9 million TEUs, up 18.2 percent.
Each month from January through June would be a record for the month, and the first half of 2021 is forecast at 11.5 million TEUs, up 22.1 percent from the same period in 2020, which experienced a major decline in imports due to the impact of COVID-19.
