Crypto News: Supply Lines: Strike day three

More than three dozen container ships have anchored outside some of the biggest ports on the Gulf and East coasts, a bottleneck that's only going to grow as a US dockworker strike intensifies and threatens to disrupt supply chains in Europe and Asia.

Vessel queues longer than a few ships are rare for the country's eastern and southern maritime gateways, but they've amassed at roughly 12 a day since early Tuesday, when some 47,000 members of the International Longshoremen's Association walked off the job.

According to ship tracking data on Bloomberg and Kuehne+Nagel's Seaexplorer, there are:

Three container ships outside Houston
Two off Mobile, Alabama
Thirteen waiting for berths in Savannah, Georgia
Six near Charleston, South Carolina
Eight lined up around Norfolk, Virginia
And six queuing for New York-New Jersey

That tally of 38 early Thursday is higher than the 28 recorded a day ago.

Ships waiting outside Savannah and Charleston Source: Bloomberg, Kuehne+Nagel

Sea-Intelligence, a Copenhagen-based maritime data and advisory firm, estimated the capacity loss to the entire container shipping industry at 2.5% in the first week of the strike.

'Very Significant'

"Should the strike last four weeks, causing almost 7 % of the global fleet to be tied up along the US East Coast, the overall impact on the supply and demand equation will be very significant," Sea-Intelligence said.

The economic damage is piling up at a rate of $3 billion a day in lost spending and production, according to Bloomberg Economics estimates.

Watch Anna Wong of Bloomberg Economics explain the potential impact of the strike on the US economy on Bloomberg Television.

Meanwhile, the scenario favoring a quick end to the impasse is fading — especially given the two sides are still bickering.

The union laid out its demands for resuming contract negotiations, and the employers group responded by saying "we cannot agree to preconditions" to do so.

QuickTake: Everything to Know About the US Port Strike

"It is now more likely we are looking at weeks rather than days as a duration for this conflict," shipping analyst Lars Jensen wrote in a LinkedIn post on Wednesday.

President Joe Biden has backed the ILA's position that the cargo handlers deserve a larger share of profits won by foreign-owned container liners during the pandemic-era supply chain crisis.

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and Democratic candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris, have each echoed the sentiment, blaming the shipping companies.

—Brendan Murray in London

Click here for more of Bloomberg.com's most-read stories about trade, supply chains and shipping.

Mercosur and Europe | German Chancellor Olaf Scholz made a fresh appeal for a swift conclusion to talks on a major trade agreement between the European Union and four South American economies that is opposed by France.

Mercedes-Benz and BMW are pressing Berlin to vote against imposing significantly higher European Union tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles.
Europe forged its plan to curb global deforestation three years ago when more than 100 world leaders pledged at a climate conference to reverse the destruction of millions of hectares of woodland every year. There was an aggressive timetable, but as with many of the European Union's green plans, it proved too much for some.
DSV won approval to buy DB Schenker, overcoming resistance from German labor unions and late attempts by a rival bidder to derail the deal. The purchase will make DSV the world's largest freight forwarder.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer promised to "stand firm" during what are likely to be difficult negotiations to forge closer ties with the EU, as he announced the first-ever UK-EU bilateral summit next year.
Read how a weapon packed with US technology killed a 6-year-old girl in Ukraine.

Bloomberg New Economy: The world faces a wide range of critical challenges, ranging from ongoing military conflict and a worsening climate crisis to the unforeseen consequences of deglobalization and accelerating artificial intelligence. But these challenges are not insurmountable. Join us in Sao Paulo on Oct. 22-23 as leaders in business and government from across the globe come together to discuss the biggest issues of our time and mark the path forward. Click here to register.

While labor strikes on the US East and Gulf Coast ports are creating headaches for shippers, the dislocations to supply chains may result in higher freight rates for transportation providers. On Bloomberg's Oct. 2 webinar on the dockworkers' strike, we discuss how the unfolding situation could impact freight markets and supply chains.
North American railroad traffic inched 0.3% higher in the past week, Association of American Railroads data show, according to Bloomberg Intelligence. Service disruptions from Hurricane Helene and freight diversions away from US East and Gulf Coast ports had significant impacts on traffic last week.
Run SPLC after an equity ticker on Bloomberg to show critical data about a company's suppliers, customers and peers.
Use the AHOY function to track global commodities trade flows.
See DSET CHOKE for a dataset to monitor shipping chokepoints.
For freight dashboards, see {BI RAIL}, {BI TRCK} and {BI SHIP} and {BI 3PLS}
Click HERE for automated stories about supply chains.
On the Bloomberg Terminal, type NH FWV for FreightWaves content.
See BNEF for BloombergNEF's analysis of clean energy, advanced transport, digital industry, innovative materials, and commodities.

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