Some good deals ahead.....
Wednesday 1st February 2023
Katy Baxter
It's been nearly two years since the Ever Given container ship blocked the Suez canal semi-paralysing the global shipping supply chain.
Even worse, at the time the Ever Given was ploughing into the desert, ports around the world had ships anchoring for weeks before lockdown-hit docks could unload them. People and businesses wanted goods, but they were stuck at sea. Packed into containers floating off the coast, or slogging around the continent of Africa to avoid the Suez Canal traffic jam.
That had a major impact in pushing up prices of imports over the past couple of years. Why?
Because 90% of all traded goods travel by sea! 11 billion tons of goods, worth $14 trillion per year. Clogging that up creates problems everywhere.
But now, global shipping is back on track. It's tough to show in a photo (it would just be the empty sea), but the chart below makes the point (click on it to make bigger).
Free-flowing trade is one key reason why inflation in goods is likely to keep falling throughout the year.
When inventories build up in company warehouses, there's only one solution. Sales! We expect to see a lot of discounts over the next year, as businesses look to shift this stock. Prepare yourself for a deluge of deals ...
