Largest L.A. 3-Month Shipping Increase Since 2006
The Port of Los Angeles reported today on May shipping volume, measured in TEUs (Twenty-foot Equivalent Units, a standardized industry measurement used when counting cargo containers of varying lengths), noting the following:May 2009 imports are greater than April 2009 due to lower warehouse inventory levels, showing some signs of improvement.
May 2009 exports are the highest for the year and greater than April 2009 due to stronger exports of raw materials.
Higher volumes May 2009 vs. May 2008 from China Shipping.
MP: Also, the three consecutive month shipping volume increases in March, April and May 2009 marks the first three month-in-a-row increase in almost three years, since the middle of 2006; and the 161,000 TEU increase over those three months is the largest three-month increase since early 2006 (see shaded areas above).
3 Comments:
I note that the 'loaded inbound' for 2008 and 2009 is about double for that 'loaded outbound'...
Is it to simplistic to think that this means an increase debt to foreign countries like China for instance?
Funny, but my data for the Port of Los Angeles shows that for April 2009:
- Total import+export value is down 27%, year-over-year. In absolute terms this level was greater than March, but had a larger percentage decline over the year than March.
- Vessel shipping weight is down 16%, year-over-year and also a decline from March
- Vessel shipping value is down 28% year-over-year, also a decline from March
Economic times series data have these things called seasons and one must remove the seasonality to get a clearer picture of trend.
Every Spring and Summer for the past 13 years (as far back as my data goes) shows the exact same seasonal increase from Jan/Feb/Mar through Aug/Sep/Oct.
April 2009 was about $8 billion (28.6%) below the trend in import+export vessel value for the Port of Los Angeles.
"...due to stronger exports of raw materials."
I believe that the crew of the S.S. Laughing Students is quite proud of its huge load of raw materials leaving L.A. Further confirmation that the U.S. is moving to Third World status.
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