RSS Feed by Calculated Risk on 2/15/2012 05:55:00 PM
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
LA area Port Traffic mostly unchanged year-over-year in January
The following graphs are for inbound and outbound traffic at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in TEUs (TEUs: 20-foot equivalent units or 20-foot-long cargo container).
Container traffic gives us an idea about the volume of goods being exported and imported - and possibly some hints about the trade report for January. LA area ports handle about 40% of the nation's container port traffic.
To remove the strong seasonal component for inbound traffic, the first graph shows the rolling 12 month average.
Click on graph for larger image.
On a rolling 12 month basis, inbound traffic is up 0.1% from December, and outbound traffic is flat.
On a rolling 12 month basis, outbound traffic is moving "sideways" for the last 4 or 5 of months, and it appears inbound traffic has halted the recent decline.
The 2nd graph is the monthly data (with a strong seasonal pattern for imports).
For the month of January, loaded inbound traffic was up 1% compared to January 2011, and loaded outbound traffic was flat compared to January 2010.
On both a rolling 12 month and year-over-year basis, imports and exports were mostly unchanged.
