Stifel Confidence Index bearish compared to 2015

In spite of a slight month-to-month rise of 0.5 points, the March edition of the Stifel Logistics Confidence Index fell 9.3 points, year-over-year, compared with March 2015. However, it is important to note that in 2015, airfreight confidence was exceptionally high, given the continued impact of the U.S. West Coast port strikes.

Three quarters of the trade lanes covered by Stifel performed well compared to the previous month, with only the Asia-to-Europe trade contracting 2.5 points to 41.4. The reverse Europe-to-Asia lane clocked a small increase of 1.3 points over February’s figures, but was still well below 50 at 39.1. Things were more upbeat on the trans-Atlantic trade lanes, with U.S.-to-Europe increasing 2.6 points, month-to-month, to 49.0 and the reverse up equally 2.6 points to 53.0 — the strongest lane on the Stifel Index for the month of March.

Looking at future expectations, the airfreight Index was nearly flat, up 0.9 points to 45.4 as growth along half of the lanes monitored by the Stifel Index was counterbalanced by contractions along the other half. Europe-to-U.S. rose the greatest amount, up 2.6 points to 52.2, while the reverse, U.S.-to-Europe, dropped 1.6 points to 53.3. Things improved slightly along the Asia-to-Europe route, which was up 0.6 points to 51.8. However, the expected outlook of Europe-to-Asia dipped below 50, down 1.6 points to 49.7.

Survey respondents “referenced both the seasonal dip in air- and seafreight volumes derived from Chinese New Year, and the current slowdown of China’s Economy” as one-offs for the month of March 2016.