Port of Los Angeles sees sustained import surge ahead of tariffs

LOS ANGELES – The busiest maritime trade complex in the US continued to move near-record levels of imports in October as businesses bring goods in ahead of potential tariff increases and seek to avoid labour-related disruptions at alternative ports.

“The Port of Los Angeles handled a robust 905,000 container units in October,” executive director Gene Seroka told reporters on Nov 20.

That is a 25 per cent gain over 2023 and is the first time the port handled more than 900,000 containers for four months in a row.

“Los Angeles processed more cargo between July and October than we did during our peak year in 2021 or our second-best year in 2022,” Mr Seroka said.

Imports at the Port of Los Angeles (LA) in October landed at 462,740 20-foot container equivalent units, or TEUs. The port also handled 122,716 export containers and 319,570 empty containers in October, according to port data.

Next door, the Port of Long Beach moved nearly one million import, export and empty containers in October, beating a record set just two months ago.

In 2024, the LA and Long Beach ports, which together account for roughly a third of all US container imports, have seen their busiest ever peak season, which began earlier – and has lasted longer – than is typical. 

The Southern California ports moved a combined 950,303 import containers in October, just shy of the 980,450 TEU record set in May 2021, when pandemic-era demand for consumer goods and supply chain snarls caused a massive backlog of ships offshore and a pile-up of containers on the docks.

The people and companies that make up every link of the supply chain have spent the last two weeks since the US election wondering whether President-elect Donald Trump will follow through fully on threats to hike levies on imports from China – and impose universal tariffs on goods from everywhere else.

As a result, businesses are poised to continue bringing in larger volumes of goods until the end of the year, normally a quieter time for the ports.

Companies have also diverted some cargo to the West Coast to avoid potential disruption at East and Gulf ports, where a dispute between dockworkers and their employers is still unresolved. 

A three-day strike shut ports from Houston to Boston in early October, and there is a possibility of a second walkout at eastern ports in early 2025 if the International Longshoremen’s Association cannot reach a contract agreement with the US Maritime Alliance, before Jan 15.

In addition to mitigating the risk from tariffs and labour concerns, Mr Seroka said he expects the healthy US economy and consumer demand to keep trade volumes in LA elevated through the end of the year. 

“Considering all this, I see our November volume coming in around 850,000 TEUs, which is stronger than what we traditionally see at this time of the year,” he added.

“To close out 2024, the Port of Los Angeles is on track to hit 10 million TEUs for only the second time in our 116-year history.” BLOOMBERG