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Ocean Oct 12, 2026 · 8 min read

Ocean spot rates slip over Golden Week as carriers aim for 19 October increases

Spot rates fell over Golden Week. The 19 October increases look unlikely to hold. Drewry’s World Container Index fell 2% to $4,351 per 40ft container in the week to 8 October. Asia–Europe has now fallen for 13 weeks in a row. In our view, the carrier increases due on 19 October will not hold. MSC filed $4,500 to North Europe. Xeneta’s Far East–North Europe spot average is $3,645, and Chinese forwarders are offering $2,650. Xeneta’s Peter Sand says “we are not at the floor yet.” Shippers should not lock in contracts yet. Our call: Shanghai–Rotterdam stays under $3,600 on Drewry’s index through November.

Golden Week is over, the peak is gone, and the carriers’ 19 October rate push is set to fail
Container spot rates slipped over China’s Golden Week holiday. Drewry’s World Container Index (WCI) is a weekly benchmark of spot prices, the one-off rates paid outside long-term contracts. It fell 2% to $4,351 per 40ft container on 8 October. Shanghai–Los Angeles dropped 3% to $7,624. Shanghai–New York dropped 2% to $10,220. Shanghai–Rotterdam fell 2% to $3,337, and Shanghai–Genoa held at $3,696. On Asia–Europe, that is 13 straight weeks of decline.
Here is our view. The transpacific peak is over. On Asia–Europe, the rate increases carriers have filed for 19 October sit about $1,000 above where cargo is actually moving. Capacity is returning through Suez. Carriers are cancelling few sailings. We do not think those increases will hold.

What the indices say

The two main spot indices tell the same story.
Drewry’s WCI, published on 8 October, showed falls across the main east–west lanes. One week earlier, on 1 October, Shanghai–New York stood at $10,428 and Shanghai–Los Angeles at $7,835 (both from Drewry, as reported by The Loadstar on 2 October). Both have now turned lower. Drewry said it “expects rates to remain stable next week” on both the transpacific and Asia–Europe. It added that the market is “expected to remain volatile in the near term”.
Xeneta’s market-average spot rates, built from rates paid across many shippers, gave these figures on 7 October:

  • Far East–North Europe: $3,645 per 40ft, down 2.5% on the week
  • Far East–Mediterranean: $4,007, down 5.9%
  • Far East–US West Coast: $8,336, up 1.1%
  • Far East–US East Coast: $11,512, up 0.5%
  • North Europe–US East Coast: $2,854, down 1.1%

The longer view is starker. According to Xeneta, Mediterranean spot rates are down 43% since 1 July. North Europe is down 34%. Peter Sand, Xeneta’s chief analyst, said: “Spot rates on the Far East to Europe trades have fallen heavily since the post-Hormuz crisis peak in July.” He added: “The pace of the decline has eased a little, but rates are still elevated and the trend is still downward, so we are not at the floor yet.”
China’s own benchmark was flat. The Shanghai Containerized Freight Index (SCFI) was 3,664.11 on 9 October, unchanged from the previous release, according to the Shanghai Shipping Exchange as reported by Eastmoney. The exchange said most lanes moved only slightly. Rates did not jump after the holiday, and they did not crash either.

The transpacific: peak passed

On the transpacific, the turn came just before the holiday. On 2 October, Sand told The Loadstar that “we can say with a level of confidence that the market has reached its post-Hormuz crisis peak in 2026”. He also said: “Demand is not strong and rates have now peaked, but they will not collapse”.
The Xeneta data already shows the first crack. Far East–US West Coast spot slipped by $2 on 7 October. Xeneta says it was the first fall since mid-September. Sand called it a marginal move, saying: “Across the Pacific, there is a first hint of a downward momentum”. Xeneta’s weekly averages are still slightly up. Drewry’s WCI is already down.
Sand also gave a three-month forecast. “Rolling forward three months, that could see spot rates into the east coast in the range of $6,000-$7,000”. He put the West Coast at $4,500–$5,500 over the same period, according to The Loadstar. Against Xeneta’s 7 October averages, that would cut both coasts by roughly 35% to 45%.
Carriers are not cutting much capacity to stop it. Drewry’s Cancelled Sailings Tracker, reported by The Loadstar on 6 October, counted 39 blank sailings (voyages cancelled outright) out of 710 scheduled from week 41 to week 45. That is about 5%. Roughly half were on the transpacific. Sea-Intelligence said the share of capacity being blanked “is actually quite low for the post-pandemic era”. Drewry’s WCI note counts four transpacific blank sailings next week, down from eleven this week.

Asia–Europe: increases filed well above the market

Asia–Europe is where carriers are trying hardest to stop the slide, and where we think they will fail.
On 2 October, The Loadstar reported FAK levels filed for 19 October. FAK stands for “freight all kinds”. It is a carrier’s standard tariff rate for general cargo, and spot quotes are often built from it. MSC filed $4,500 per 40ft to North Europe and the west Mediterranean. CMA CGM filed $4,700 to the west Med and $4,900 to the east Med. These were the reported filings at that date. Check with your carriers before 19 October for any revisions.
Now set those numbers against the market:

  • MSC’s $4,500 to North Europe is $855, or 23%, above Xeneta’s $3,645 average. It is $1,163, or 35%, above Drewry’s Shanghai–Rotterdam figure of $3,337.
  • CMA CGM’s $4,700 to the west Med is $693 above Xeneta’s Med average of $4,007. It is $1,004 above Drewry’s Shanghai–Genoa figure of $3,696.
  • The Loadstar saw unsolicited offers from Chinese forwarders of $2,650 per 40ft to Felixstowe and Southampton. That is $1,850 below MSC’s filed level.

Forwarders doubted the increase as soon as it was filed. A European forwarder told The Loadstar: “My feeling is it’s an optimistic push to keep rates up and/or slow the decline”. The same report said carriers were still cutting their first-half October FAKs at the time.
The supply side works against the carriers too. On 1 October, The Loadstar reported that “October will see almost all global ocean carriers make a tentative return to Suez transits on Asia-Europe sailings” (republished by gCaptain). The Premier Alliance’s FE1 service is set to send ONE’s 8,100 TEU One Continuity from Laem Chabang on 19 October. The ship is due at Suez on 9 November and in Rotterdam on 19 November. COSCO’s 24,200 TEU OOCL Spain was scheduled for a westbound Suez transit on 4 October, COSCO’s first westbound Suez voyage in more than two years, according to Linerlytica. MSC announced in August that it would partially restore Suez transits on some east–west services, The Loadstar reported on 25 August.
A shorter route through Suez means each ship completes more round trips a year. That adds real capacity without adding a single new vessel. Drewry’s own warning, quoted by The Loadstar, is that “the faster-than-expected return to the Suez route remains the biggest threat to carrier efforts to support rates”. In its 6 October tracker, Drewry said “the return of services to the Suez route is adding capacity to the trade”. Asia–Europe blank sailings are low as well: six next week, up from five this week, according to the WCI note.

What forwarders should do now

European contract season has started. Xeneta notes that shippers “also benchmark against the short-term market” when negotiating long-term contracts. It adds that easing competition for space is helping forwarders get better terms from carriers.
That gives forwarders leverage. Here is how we would use it.
Do not accept 19 October FAKs at face value. Ask for the rate that will actually apply on the sailing date. Get it in writing with a short validity period.
Keep quote validity short on Asia–Europe. If spot keeps falling, a 30-day quote at today’s level will look expensive by mid-November. Two weeks is safer for both sides.
Watch the surcharges as closely as the base rate. Chantal McRoberts, head of advisory at Drewry Supply Chain Advisors, said: “It’s the surcharges that are causing the biggest consternation”. The Loadstar reports she pointed to inflated fuel and pre-peak charges. She added “it’s really important that shippers put up guardrails around contract rates”. In practice, that means caps or clear formulas for every add-on charge in a contract.
Do not anchor contracts on spot alone. On 12 October, The Loadstar reported Sea-Intelligence research showing that spot rates have tracked the wider market less reliably since 2020. Sea-Intelligence said: “The data merely shows that spot rates have become more volatile than the market totality”. A falling WCI is a useful argument at the table. It is not the full picture of what carriers will accept for a year of volume.
On the transpacific, prepare US importers for lower rates, but not a cliff. Sand expects a decline, not a collapse. If you sell transpacific space, fixed-price quotes running into December carry more risk than they did a month ago.

Our call

These are our predictions, not market data.
First, the 19 October Asia–Europe FAKs will not hold. Drewry’s WCI for Shanghai–Rotterdam will stay below $3,600 per 40ft every week through the end of November. That would leave it at least $900 below MSC’s filed North Europe level.
Second, the Mediterranean will keep falling faster than North Europe. It fell 5.9% last week against 2.5% for North Europe, and the highest FAKs filed are for the Med. We expect Xeneta’s Far East–Med average to drop below $3,700 by mid-November.
Third, the transpacific decline will speed up as US holiday cargo clears. We expect Drewry’s Shanghai–New York rate to fall below $9,000 per 40ft by the end of November. That would put it on course for Sand’s $6,000–$7,000 range by the turn of the year.
If carriers want to prove us wrong, they will need to cancel far more sailings than the roughly 5% they are blanking now. We do not see that happening before November.

Sources