Flexport’s Ocean Timeliness Indicator measures the amount of time taken to ship freight from the point at which cargo is ready to leave the exporter to when it is collected from its destination port. The ocean shipping world tends to run along “trade lanes.” The two biggest trade lanes carry goods from Asia to North America and from Asia to Europe. The OTI captures timeliness on each of these. In our latest update, both the Transpacific Eastbound (TPEB) and Far East Westbound (FEWB) measures dipped versus a week earlier but remain close to all time highs.

The Methodology: The Flexport Ocean Timeliness Indicator (OTI) utilizes data from Flexport’s ocean shipping operations for an expansive view of a container’s journey. Updated on a weekly basis, it shows the time taken to transit from Cargo Ready Date at exporters’ gate to the Destination Port Departure date when products are ready to leave port to go to importers. Measures are shown for Far East Westbound (e.g., China-to-Europe) and Transpacific Eastbound (e.g., China-to-US) routes. More details about the OTI can be found in our background report.

Week to Jan. 30, 2022

The OTI for TPEB and FEWB both inched lower but remained close to all-time highs.

FEWB dipped by one day versus a week earlier to reach 109 days. Improved handling times at the ports offset a modest increase in ocean voyage times. The total is still only 3% below its peak.

TPEB meanwhile dipped by three days to 110 days. By contrast to FEWB there was an improvement in ocean voyage times, though a recent build-up in port congestion on the US east coast should be a warning that the system is still under stress.

In order to gain deeper insights into the development of the TPEB lane we have also introduced a new measure as part of our Logistics Pressure Matrix.

The Stage 1 measure covers the period from Cargo Ready Date to Origin Port Departure for the TPEB route for journeys that completed that stage in the past week. While shown only on an indexed, four-week average basis it provides a sense as to whether bottlenecks early in the journey are declining.

In the latest calculations, covering the four weeks to Jan. 30, 2022, the measure was only down by 0.5% in the past four weeks, though it was down by 7% from the early November 2021 peak. While that may indicate a steady relaxation of pressure on logistics networks, the index is still at double its Feb. 2020 level.

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

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.

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