Tariffs:
A set of country-specific tariffs is projected to take effect on August 1st (pending confirmation via Executive Order/Federal Register notice), unless countries reach a trade agreement with the U.S. before then. It remains to be seen if that August 1st deadline will get pushed back as it did back in July, but for now that’s the projected effective date.
Some of the expected tariffs include a 50% tariff on Brazil, a 35% tariff on Canada, a 30% tariff on the EU and Mexico, and a 25% tariff on South Korea, ABC News and CNBC reports. So far, the Administration says they’ve made deals with the United Kingdom, Vietnam, Indonesia and Japan, as well as a framework deal with China.
There’s growing discussion that the Trump Administration may roll out industry-specific tariffs to complement the existing country-by-country measures. According to Transport Topics, President Trump announced plans to impose a 50% tariff on copper imports, though no effective date has been provided. In addition, Supply Chain Dive reports that a 93.5% tariff on graphite imports from China is also in the works, with final determinations expected by early December. Similar investigations have been launched into semiconductors and pharmaceuticals, though details – including potential implementation timelines – remain limited.
Capacity:
— Ocean container capacity during the month of July is expected to be a bit flat. According to maritime intelligence provider eeSea, about 175,000 TEUs of container capacity is set to be blanked during the month of July, which amounts to 11% of deployed capacity between Asia and the U.S. West Coast.
According to data and analysis from Drewry, their World Container Index (WCI) from Thursday, July 17th dropped 2.6% that week. Which, as they report, is the fifth straight week for a decline.
Port Volumes:
— The Port of Rotterdam recently released their first half of 2025 port volume data, of which they saw total throughput decrease by 4.1% but container throughput increasing by 2.7% (7 million TEUs), per their press release. The port also states that they experienced significant congestion in the flow of handling containers.