World Container Index falls 3% as transpacific rates slide

The east-west spot market split in the last week of October. Drewry’s World Container Index fell 3% to US$4,429 per 40ft container in its assessment for 29 October, the first decline after two weekly gains, and the consultancy attributed the move mainly to the transpacific. Asia to Europe moved the other way. The composite is a weighted average across eight east-west lanes, and a fall of that size on two of them was enough to outweigh small gains on the Europe lanes.

Drewry had not published a newer assessment when this update was prepared on 5 November, so the 29 October reading remains the latest available. The other providers have published since, and they describe the same split with different amplitudes.

Spot Rates

Drewry’s lane detail for 29 October is unambiguous. Shanghai to Los Angeles fell 6% to US$7,514 per 40ft container and Shanghai to New York fell 5% to US$9,631. Shanghai to Rotterdam inched up 1% to US$3,686 and Shanghai to Genoa was unchanged at US$4,151. The consultancy’s own trade grouping puts the transatlantic down 2% for the week.

Freightos, in the weekly update reported by FreightWaves on 4 November and covering the week to 30 October, has Asia to the US East Coast at about US$9,900 per FEU, down 6% week on week but still roughly US$200 above its level two weeks earlier, and the West Coast near US$8,300 per FEU. On the Europe side it has Asia to North Europe broadly unchanged at US$3,595 per FEU and Asia to the Mediterranean 3% higher at US$4,375. Its FBX composite stood at US$3,513.40 per 40ft when checked on 5 November, about 1% below the US$3,560.20 shown a week earlier, which matches the 1% weekly decline reported by Container News.

The Chinese benchmarks barely moved in the same window. The Shanghai Containerized Freight Index (SCFI), which covers spot export rates from Shanghai, added 6.01 points to 3,687.35 in the assessment for 30 October, a gain of 0.16%, according to Container News, which names the exchange and the period. The China Containerized Freight Index rose 0.30% to 1,881.82 and the Ningbo Containerized Freight Index, which this host cannot fetch, slipped 0.72% to 2,491.26 in the same report.

Index (provider)	Trade lane	Unit	Period	Level	Change	Source
World Container Index (Drewry)	Composite, eight east-west lanes	per 40ft	Week to 29 Oct 2026	US$4,429	-3% week on week	Drewry
World Container Index (Drewry)	Shanghai to Los Angeles	per 40ft	Week to 29 Oct 2026	US$7,514	-6% week on week	Drewry
World Container Index (Drewry)	Shanghai to New York	per 40ft	Week to 29 Oct 2026	US$9,631	-5% week on week	Drewry
World Container Index (Drewry)	Shanghai to Rotterdam	per 40ft	Week to 29 Oct 2026	US$3,686	+1% week on week	Drewry
World Container Index (Drewry)	Shanghai to Genoa	per 40ft	Week to 29 Oct 2026	US$4,151	Unchanged	Drewry
FBX composite (Freightos Baltic Index)	Global, weighted average of twelve lanes	per 40ft	Checked 5 Nov 2026	US$3,513.40	-1%, from US$3,560.20 on 29 Oct	Freightos
SCFI composite (Shanghai Shipping Exchange, as reported)	Shanghai export lanes, all routes	index points	30 Oct 2026, vs 23 Oct	3,687.35	+0.16%, from 3,681.34	Container News
CCFI (Shanghai Shipping Exchange, as reported)	China export lanes, all routes	index points	30 Oct 2026, vs 23 Oct	1,881.82	+0.30%, from 1,876.27	Container News
NCFI (Ningbo Shipping Exchange, as reported)	Ningbo export lanes, all routes	index points	30 Oct 2026, vs 23 Oct	2,491.26	-0.72%, from 2,509.30	Container News
NYFI (NYSHEX)	Asia to US West Coast	index level as published	30 Oct 2026, vs 23 Oct	7,724.52	+1.92%, from 7,579.09	Container News
NYFI (NYSHEX)	Asia to US East Coast	index level as published	30 Oct 2026, vs 23 Oct	10,125.18	+1.89%, from 9,936.89	Container News
NYFI (NYSHEX)	Asia to North Europe	index level as published	30 Oct 2026, vs 23 Oct	3,203.78	+5.40%, from 3,039.67	Container News
Intra-Asia Container Index (Drewry, as reported)	Intra-Asia composite	per 40ft	Reading reported 5 Nov 2026	US$1,504	+US$46 on the week	The Loadstar

The transpacific is where the readings disagree, and the disagreement is about method rather than market direction. Drewry has Shanghai to Los Angeles down 6%, while NYSHEX’s NYFI, which is built from rates on containers that have actually shipped rather than from spot quotes, has Asia to the US West Coast up 1.92% and the East Coast up 1.89% for 30 October. Those are different baskets measuring different things over slightly different windows, and one can rise while the other falls without either being wrong. The same pattern holds on Asia to Europe, where NYFI rose 5.40% while Drewry recorded a 1% gain on Rotterdam and no change on Genoa.

The level differences matter as much as the direction. Freightos has Asia to North Europe at US$3,595 per FEU and Drewry has Shanghai to Rotterdam at US$3,686 per 40ft, which is close enough to be a port and sample effect. On the Pacific the gap is wider: Freightos near US$8,300 per FEU on the West Coast against Drewry’s US$7,514 per 40ft, roughly US$800 apart, and the two use different port pairs and collection methods. The transpacific premium has been a capacity story for most of this year, and a widening gap between benchmarks is one of the ways that shows up.

Alphaliner’s read on the same trade, reported by Splash 247, puts the divergence in revenue terms: at about US$7,500 per FEU on the 5,775 nautical mile Shanghai to Los Angeles voyage, a carrier earns roughly US$1.30 per container per nautical mile, against 26 cents on Shanghai to Rotterdam via the Cape of Good Hope and 34 cents via Suez. That is revenue, not margin, and it goes some way to explaining why tonnage keeps arriving on the Pacific even as spot rates there soften.

Capacity and Blank Sailings

Drewry’s Cancelled Sailings Tracker dated 30 October counts 56 blank sailings across the major east-west trades between week 45 (2 to 8 November) and week 49 (1 to 7 December), against 715 planned sailings. That is an 8% cancellation rate, with 92% of scheduled services expected to operate. Asia to North Europe and the Mediterranean accounts for 46% of the cancellations, the transpacific eastbound for 36% and the transatlantic for 18%. Gemini Cooperation has the lowest projected blanking rate among the major carrier groups at 1%, Drewry reported.

The week-on-week counts in the WCI commentary point the other way from the monthly programme. Six blank sailings have been announced on the transpacific for the week after the assessment, up from five in the assessment week, which Drewry reads as tight capacity. On Asia-Europe the count fell from eight to four, which it reads as more effective capacity on that trade. A smaller blanking programme on Europe alongside a rising rate is consistent with demand holding up there, and a larger one on the Pacific alongside a falling rate is consistent with carriers defending a level they are losing anyway.

Sea-Intelligence’s release on 5 November adds the operational layer. It measures service instability as the standard deviation of the number of weekly offered services, expressed as a percentage of the average, and compares the post-pandemic period with the 2013 to 2019 baseline. Asia to North Europe shows a 78% increase in weekly service instability and Asia to the Mediterranean 71%, against 48% on Asia to the US West Coast and 26% on the East Coast. The consequence it describes is mechanical: arrivals bunch, ports receive uneven waves of vessels and containers, and congestion and reliability get worse in both directions. Schedule reliability is the measure that captures the result, and it has been poor all year.

The capacity being deployed is at record levels even as this instability rises. Sea-Intelligence’s 29 October note put average weekly deployed capacity in October and November above 350,000 TEU on Asia to North Europe and above 260,000 TEU on Asia to the Mediterranean, with Asia to the US West Coast at nearly 393,000 TEU in October and heading for 400,000 TEU in November, which it attributes to vessel bunching rather than to new services. Deployed capacity and effective capacity are not the same number, and a schedule inflated by delayed departures can coexist with a tight market in the weeks the cargo actually sails.

Suez transits rose to 62 vessels last week, the highest weekly level this year, Drewry reported, while only two vessels transited the Strait of Hormuz. The Red Sea return is now large enough to be a supply event in its own right: Xeneta puts weekly capacity committed to the Red Sea at 467,297 TEU in October, about 50% of the August 2023 pre-crisis level but roughly double the figure at the end of August 2026, with 599,000 TEU already released from Cape of Good Hope diversions. Premier Alliance is adding two Asia to Mediterranean services to its Suez network in November, FreightWaves reported. The Suez return is still only half finished, which is why its capacity effect is arriving gradually rather than at once.

Costs and Surcharges

Bunker prices fell on the day but remain high in absolute terms. Ship & Bunker’s posting for 4 November had Singapore VLSFO at US$901.50 per tonne, down US$40.00 day on day, Rotterdam at US$747.00, down US$8.50, and its four-port average at US$830.00, down US$28.50.

The cost line that matters for carriers is the quarter rather than the day. Maersk’s third-quarter report, covered by Ship & Bunker, shows bunker consumption down 6.3% year on year to 2.51m FOE tonnes, average bunker price up 49% to US$798 per FOE tonne and bunker costs up 37% to US$2.1bn. Ship & Bunker links the cost increase in part to higher fuel prices tied to the Middle East war, and the level of Singapore VLSFO on 4 November, at US$901.50 per tonne, shows that pressure has not gone away.

On the revenue side, carriers are seeking increases of US$2,000 to US$3,000 per FEU for November on the transpacific, with forwarders telling Freightos that improving space availability and steadier schedules make them doubt the increases will stick. Drewry makes the same point about Asia-Europe: higher FAK rates have been announced for November, but with capacity available and demand weak it is not clear they will hold. These are announced intentions and posted surcharges, not collected revenue, and they sit outside the index levels in the table above. The indexes measure spot base rates and roll some surcharges in, depending on the provider, so a headline GRI number and a composite reading are not directly comparable.

What It Means

Three things are true at once, and the composites are the wrong instrument for separating them. The transpacific spot market is softening from a very high base as US import demand eases, Asia to Europe is holding because demand there has been stronger and the Suez return has not yet delivered all of its capacity, and the capacity being deployed on paper is at a record partly because delayed vessels are bunching into the same weeks.

The demand side is the clearest signal. Drewry cites a National Retail Federation forecast of an 11% month on month fall in US ocean import volumes in November, which is what an end to a long peak season looks like, and Freightos notes that transpacific rates remain roughly US$5,500 per FEU above pre-peak levels, so there is room to fall before anything looks abnormal. Xeneta’s numbers make the scale of the run-up plain: Asia to the US West Coast rose 343% between 28 February and 31 October, according to its chief analyst Peter Sand.

Xeneta used its Munich summit on 5 November to publish a 2027 outlook that puts a number on the other side of that: a 30% fall in the global average spot rate and a 5% fall in the global average long-term rate, both full-year averages against a third-quarter 2026 baseline, with demand growth slowing to between 2.5% and 4% and fleet growth of 6.8%. That is Xeneta’s forecast, not this publication’s, and Sand qualified it himself, noting that rates were expected to soften in each of the past three years before the Red Sea crisis, the US tariffs and then the Hormuz crisis pushed them the other way. Anyone reading the current decline as the start of a straight line down should read that caveat alongside it.

For now the market is a set of diverging lanes rather than a single direction. The composite fell 3%, and it fell for a reason that is specific to the Pacific. Last week’s update described a market where both headhauls were rising on record capacity. One week later the Pacific has turned and Europe has not, and the gap between the two is the thing worth watching into the slack season.