Dating back to September 2022, Maersk has already suspended an Asia-US east coast loop. Ocean carriers like Maersk and MSC had announced a series of canceled sailings in response to the reduction in bookings to North America due to a huge demand drop in global trade lanes.

As of October 2022, Maersk made a decision to cut back on capacity of its Asia-North Europe service. And in an official announcement Maersk said that such a move was to balance the network accordingly.

The decreasing shipment bookings, particularly from China, are propelling ocean carriers to take steps to avoid spot and short-term contract rates plunging further.

Following the recent culling of services on the Transpacific by ocean carriers, there are more suspensions and merging of some Asia-North Europe loops in order to mitigate the impact of plummeting freight rates.

The first vessel affected would be MSC Hamburg, a 16652-TEU container ship scheduled to sail from Ningbo on 26 October. It would have called at Ningbo, Xiamen, Yantian, Tanjung Pelepas, Malaysia, Zeebrugge, Rotterdam, and Bremerhaven. MSC, another 2M alliance member, advised that the sailing of MSC Hamburg to resume a week later.

MSC declined to comment on its sailing cancellation. While Maersk made a promise that the capacity would be brought back once the cargo demand recovered. Maersk also added that customers had better rebook cargo to the remaining network in advance so the adverse impact could be minimized.