Asia-Europe spot rates continued to slide in the last week of August with the
SCFI rates to North Europe slipping by 11.9% while rates to the Mediterranean
dropped by 9.7%.
Carriers continued to undercut each other with FAK rates dropping to the
$5,500/feu level with no action to cut capacity in September as blanked
sailings are only planned in October. These measures would come too late to
arrest the rate decline, with current EC futures already pricing in a 50%
reduction to current levels by