This week, the Flexport OTI showed potentially meaningful fluctuations as out-of-pattern moves emerged for both China to North Europe and China to the U.S. West Coast. Meanwhile, China to the U.S. East Coast exhibited a slight drop.

Welcome to the new Ocean Timeliness Indicator! Due to ongoing global shipping events in the Panama and Suez Canal, we have refined our previous report by splitting the Transpacific Eastbound (TPEB) trade lane into two subtradelanes: TPEB to the U.S. West Coast, and TPEB to the U.S. East Coast.

Week to December 16, 2024

This week, the Ocean Timeliness Indicator (OTI) has dropped for China to the U.S. West Coast, falling from 35.5 to 34.5 days. China to the U.S. East Coast has shown a minor drop, moving from 63 to 62.5 days. Meanwhile, China to Northern Europe jumped from 70.5 to 72 days.

Please direct questions about the Flexport OTI to press@flexport.com.

The Methodology: The Flexport Ocean Timeliness Indicator (OTI) utilizes data from Flexport’s ocean shipping operations for an expansive view of the cargo’s journey. Updated on a weekly basis, the Flexport OTI shows the transit time from the cargo ready date at the exporters’ factory or warehouse to the containers’ departure from the destination ocean port. The ocean shipping world tends to run along “trade lanes.” The three biggest east-west trade lanes carry goods from Asia to the U.S. West Coast, Asia to the U.S. East Coast, and from Asia to Northern Europe. The OTI captures the timeliness of each. As there are many transit time nuances from port to port and service to service, to show accurate trends, the OTI uses the following logic:

• Excludes premium services.
• Displayed transit times are based on a trailing two-week median.
• Major origin and destination ports are used as a proxy for the overall trade lane to create clear trends. Other origin or destination ports will have additional transit time considerations based on ocean carrier services.
• Asia to U.S. West Coast trade lane uses the China ports of Shanghai and Ningbo and the U.S. West Coast ports of Los Angeles/Long Beach.
• Asia to U.S. East Coast trade lane uses the China ports of Shanghai and Ningbo and the U.S. East Coast ports of New York/New Jersey and Norfolk.
• Asia to North Europe trade lane uses the China ports of Shanghai and Ningbo and the North Europe port of Rotterdam.

Disclaimer: The contents of this report are made available for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon for any legal, business, or financial decisions. Flexport does not guarantee, represent, or warrant any of the contents of this report because they are based on our current beliefs, expectations, and assumptions, about which there can be no assurance due to various anticipated and unanticipated events that may occur. This report has been prepared to the best of our knowledge and research; however, the information presented herein may not reflect the most current regulatory or industry developments. Neither Flexport nor its advisors or affiliates shall be liable for any losses that arise in any way due to the reliance on the contents contained in this report.