Global Container Shipping Market 2024-2030
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Global Container Shipping Market 2024-2030

Last Updated:  Apr 25, 2025 | Study Period: 2024-2030

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET

 

INTRODUCTION

 

For decades, since 1960s, the growth in container shipping volumes have outpaced global economic growth. At times, growing four times as fast as global GDP, reduced to just two after 2008 crisis and now it is down to less than 1.5. In coming years, in the light of on-going trade war and near-shoring, it could potentially come down to just 1.

 

Info Graphic: global container shipping market, Container Shipping Market

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET DYNAMICS

 

SI.noTimelineDevelopments
1Q4-2021Maersk is partnering as a joint venture with Grindrod Limited to maximize the shipping activities of logistics and services in South Africa. Maersk to invest 51% in the joint venture to get access to the logistics services.
2Q4-2021Taiwan’s shipping company Evergreen Marine Corporation ordered 24000 twenty-foot equivalent containers from China’s Jiangnan Shipyard in a $320 million deal.
3Q4-2021CMA CGM group provides incentive offers for importing customers, to pick up their containers within eight days of arrival at Los Angeles and Long Beach. The incentive is $100 for daytime pickups and  $200 for night and weekend pickups within 8 days. 
4Q4-2021Chinese company Cosco signed a joint venture agreement with 45% equity in Tianjin Container Terminal(TCT) to develop an international shipping hub in north China. Cosco also buys a 35% stake in Hamburg and Logistics.
5Q4-2021Hyundai from South Korea received orders from French shipping company CMA CGA to construct 2000 twenty-foot equivalent containers in its Hyundai Mipo Dockyard(HMD) with a budget of $627 million.

 

Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) and Nihon Shipyard Ltd have been contracted by Ocean Network Express (ONE) to build its first containership newbuilding. Orders have been placed for the Japanese joint venture container, which will be split equally between HHI and Nihon Shipyard. The container line's newbuilding orders are intended to help lower the company's carbon footprint.

 

There is still a dispute in the industry about whether to use LNG as a fuel, which may lead to zero emissions, or to go straight to green fuels. The newbuilds were pre-programmed to run on ammonia or methanol as well as carbon capture and storage.

 

ONE will be able to expand its long-term exploration of alternative fuels and decarbonization technologies in the future. It remains fully committed to attaining carbon neutrality in order to achieve sustainable marine transportation.

 

Shanghai port is assisting in the stabilization of port operations both during and after the epidemic, and will make every effort to maintain Shanghai's status as it is the world's busiest container port.

 

The US Department of Transportation has worked with ports to propose a container dwell fee to reduce port congestion, launched a trucking action plan to recruit and retain more drivers, funded pop-up container yards to get goods from ships to shelves faster while supporting agricultural exporters, moved supply chain operators toward 24/7 operations, and launched Freight Logistics Optimization Works (FLOW), a data sharing effort with Target, FedEx, UPS, True Value, and others.

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKETFREIGHT MOVEMENT

 

The US-China tariff war has hit container volumes between the two most important region Stand freight traffic is down by ~7% (Jan-Sep 2019). Vietnam has emerged as the biggest beneficiary of this and its exports have jumped by ~32% in the same period.

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET FREIGHT RATES

 

Ocean freight rates are among the biggest indicators of global trade health, higher rates equate to higher freight demand and vice-versa. Another important metric is the number of containers in global circulation. There were ~ 22 Million 20-foot-equivalent units (TEU) containers in circulation as of Sep 2019.

 

As od Sep 2019, the freight rates have been declining in all US and European trade routes for past few months. The freight rate between Shanghai to the US east coast was ~$2,700 for a 40Ft container in Aug 2019, ~24% lower than same period last year. As this is the time when retailers and distributors stock up good for upcoming holiday season, the declining rate are certainly not at all a good sign.

 

The additional 71 ultra large ships (14,500 TEU+ capacity), which will be delivered by 2021 end will further bring down the rates.

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET LEGISLATIVE CHALLENGES

 

On January 1, 2020, the International Maritime Organization (IMO)’s rules on sulphur emission come into force – it will have a significant impact on the shipping industry. This legislation will ban any penalize and ban any ship emitting more than 0.5% of sulphur in its fuel, a sharp cut of 3% from present level. Therefore, planning for this low sulphur exhaust implementation will be one of the container shipping industry’s biggest challenges in 2019.

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET SIZE AND FORECAST

 

infographic: Info Graphic: global container shipping market, Container Shipping Market

 

The volume carried by container shipping is expected to be double by 2030. However, in the few years, the industry has been operating at a loss. If we look at YTD 2019, global container shipping volumes were just ~1.3% higher than in the same period of 2018.

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET RECENT TRENDS

 

SI.noTimelineCompanyDevelopments
1Q4-2021CMA CGMCMA CGM group has made a deal to acquire a majority stake in Fenix Marine Services in Los Angeles for $2.3 billion.
2Q3-2021Adani PortAdani Port to reduce fees for the ships which use liquefied natural gas as fuel, the group will  cut 50% discount charges under CO2 reduction norms. 
3Q3-2021Xeneta Shipping IndexXeneta Shipping Index from Norway, raises $28.5 million in its series C funding with a $130 million valuation, the funding is used for its business operations.
4Q4-2021NYK NYK shipping company is working to reduce green gas emissions from ships by researching battery hybrid systems with the partnership of Winterthur Gas and Diesel Ltd(WinGD) and the American Bureau of Shipping(ABS).

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

 

SI.noTimelineCompanyDevelopments
1Q4-2021Maersk Group Leading shipping company Maersk Group announced third-quarter revenue of $16.6 billion with a 68% rise in revenue from last year's same quarter due to high demand in global logistics.
2Q4-2021HMMHMM shipping made $3.4 billion in revenue in the third quarter with total earnings ten times the previous year quarter.
3Q4-2021CMA CGMCMA CGM made a total profit of $5.6 billion in the third quarter, the company's shipping business doubling in sales for the period.
4Q4-2021EvergreenEvergreen Marine Corporation announced a net profit of $2.88 billion during the third quarter.

 

Following two years of deep consolidation which has resulted in an oligopoly status on major trade routes, consisting of just three main alliances –2M, THE Alliance, Ocean Alliance.

 

MARKET SHARE OF SHIPPING COMPANIES BEFORE CONSOLIDATION

 

container-shipping-market-share before consolidation

Source: Internal database

 

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKET COMPANIES PROFILED

  1. P. Moller Maersk
  2. MSC Shipping
  3. CMA CGM
  4. COSCO
  5. Evergreen
  6. Hapag
  7. OOCL
  8. YMMTC
  9. Hamburg Sud
  10. NYK

 

CONTAINER SHIPPING MARKETREPORT WILL ANSWER FOLLOWING QUESTIONS

  1. The market size (both volume (Million TEU) and value($Billion) of container shipping market in 2021-2026 and every year in between
  2. Latest freight rate trends in container shipping market
  3. Impact of blockchain on container shipping market
Sl noTopic
1Market Segmentation
2Scope of the report
3Abbreviations
4Research Methodology
5Executive Summary
6Introduction
7Insights from Industry stakeholders
8Cost breakdown of Product by sub-components and average profit margin
9Disruptive innovation in the Industry
10Technology trends in the Industry
11Consumer trends in the industry
12Recent Production Milestones
13Component Manufacturing in US, EU and China
14COVID-19 impact on overall market
15COVID-19 impact on Production of components
16COVID-19 impact on Point of sale
17Market Segmentation, Dynamics and Forecast by Geography, 2021-2026
18Market Segmentation, Dynamics and Forecast by Product Type, 2021-2026
19Market Segmentation, Dynamics and Forecast by Application, 2021-2026
20Market Segmentation, Dynamics and Forecast by End use, 2021-2026
21Product installation rate by OEM, 2021
22Incline/Decline in Average B-2-B selling price in past 5 years
23Competition from substitute products
24Gross margin and average profitability of suppliers
25New product development in past 12 months
26M&A in past 12 months
27Growth strategy of leading players
28Market share of vendors, 2021
29Company Profiles
30Unmet needs and opportunity for new suppliers
31Conclusion
32Appendix