The improving US economic outlook is driving the return of Asia import growth, with macro and micro signs pointing to a stronger year for Asia-US trade than anticipated just months ago.<\/p>\n
US imports from Asia have been rising on a year-over-year basis since October, with February volumes up more than 30% from a year ago, according to early readings of data from PIERS, a sister product of the Journal of Commerce within S&P Global, when retailers and wholesalers were still destocking after an unprecedented import surge in 2021 and 2022. Separately, US retailers last week increased their forecasts for first-half import volumes for the second month in a row.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think…we could see physically on the terminals that since November, the imports have been picking up into the US and into the Canada gateways…,\u201d Jeremy Nixon, CEO of Ocean Network Express (ONE), told TPM24 last week. \u201cI was actually out on the terminals (in Southern California) yesterday, and you could see that the terminals are already working at quite high utilizations.\u201d<\/p>\n
Strong US employment, record-high wages and a rising housing market are driving strong imports. Importers, according to Nixon, are getting over their overstocked \u201cbig hangover\u201d and have \u201cpunched (their way) through\u201d what he likened to 18 months of indigestion. He told TPM24 that the automotive sector looked strong for this year and next, and so do cargoes tied to decarbonization, ranging from solar panels to electric vehicle components.<\/p>\n
Rising economic tide lifts most goods<\/p>\n
Fiscal loosening, as inflation eases yet still hangs over the economy, is pushing the US toward a so-called softer economic landing, brightening the prospects of stronger import volume growth. S&P Global recently lifted its forecast for US real gross domestic product (GDP) because the economy has exceeded expectations in early 2024, said Chris Williamson, chief business economist for S&P Global, parent company of the Journal of Commerce. US GDP this year will expand at a 2.4% clip rather than the original forecast of a 1.7% uptick, according to S&P Global.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are\u202fvery few signs of recessions becoming imminent in the US or elsewhere,\u201d Williamson said at TPM24.<\/p>\n
Globally, factories are finally revving back to pre-pandemic production levels. An index measuring the upstream supply chain from manufacturing lines shows that demand for raw materials, commodities and components is recovering. The February reading of the GEP Global Supply Chain Volatility Index showed an essentially flat reading of 50, resulting in a 10-month high for the barometer created by procurement software provider GEP with S&P Global\u2019s help.<\/p>\n
While the growth of financial services is leading the muted global economic recovery, manufacturing is starting to show strength, Williamson said. In February, S&P\u2019s global manufacturing purchasing managers\u2019 index (PMI) hit an 18-month high and notched its first measure of growth since August 2022.<\/p>\n
\u201cGlobal manufacturing output and global goods exports are turning up quite nicely,\u201d Williamson said. \u201cTrade and exports are showing signs of stabilizing.\u201d<\/p>\n
As was the case during the pandemic-driven import boom, US consumers are the hungriest for goods coming off the assembly line. The National Retail Federation\u2019s Global Port Tracker last week upgraded its expectations for US imports through the first half of 2024. US imports for the first six months of the year are now expected to be up 7.8% compared with the first half of 2023. That\u2019s a significant revision and the second within two months; retailers just last month were expecting more modest growth of 5.3%.<\/p>\n
Here comes the capacity<\/p>\n
The volume projections from US retailers appear to be resonating with container lines. Asia outbound vessel capacity is rising to make more room for spring clothing, furniture for new homes and whatever outdoor furniture was not snagged during the pandemic. Ocean capacity between Asia and the US in March and April will rise approximately 22% to well over 1.3 million TEUs each month compared with deployments in January and February, according Drewry Container Capacity Insight, which bases forecasts on announced carrier sailings.<\/p>\n
US consumers may be more sensitive to prices as inflation continues to drag, with even wealthy big spenders picking a more modest Rolex and the rest of us tilting toward generic goods, but, ultimately, we\u2019re still spending. Adjusting to price inflation, US consumers spent nearly 30% more on durable goods in the fourth quarter of last year than in pre-pandemic Q4 2019, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Betting against upward import growth this year \u2014 and against the resilience of the US consumer \u2014 looks unwise.<\/p>\n
Source:<\/p>\n
Szakonyi, M. (2024, March 14). Asia import projections rise on surprising US economic strengthening<\/i>. Journal of Commerce. https:\/\/www.joc.com\/article\/asia-import-projections-rise-surprising-us-economic-strengthening_20240314.html<\/p>\n The improving US economic outlook is driving the return of Asia import growth, with macro and micro signs pointing to a stronger year for Asia-US trade than anticipated just months ago. US imports from Asia have been rising on a year-over-year basis since October, with February volumes up more than 30% from a year ago, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[89,84],"class_list":["post-2922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-logistics","tag-maritime"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2922"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2923,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2922\/revisions\/2923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ems.cohesionfreight.com.hk:8080\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}