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Global shipping companies are moving full steam ahead with commercial vessel orders from Chinese shipyards, despite the U.S. targeting those ships with port fees aimed at countering China’s maritime dominance, a new report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies showed.<\/p>\n
Chinese shipyards captured 53% of all global ship orders by tonnage during the first eight months of 2025, according to the CSIS analysis of S&P Global data released on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
That was on par with full-year 2023 levels before the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) launched the China maritime probe that paved the way for the port fees, CSIS said.<\/p>\n
“Shipping companies are largely moving forward with business as usual,” said Brian Hart, a fellow with the China Power Project at CSIS and an author of the report. “So far, it doesn’t look like these policies will achieve a significant shift away from China.”<\/p>\n
China’s share of global ship orders by tonnage had jumped to 73% in 2024, suggesting shipowners were seeking to lock in contracts before potential USTR restrictions took effect.<\/p>\n
Starting October 14, ships built in China – or operated or owned by Chinese entities – will need to pay a fee at their first port of call in the United States.<\/p>\n
That fee could top $1 million for a ship carrying more than 10,000 containers and is slated to rise annually through 2028, according to analyst estimates.<\/p>\n
The port fees on China-linked vessels are part of a broader U.S. effort to revive domestic shipbuilding and to blunt China’s growing naval and commercial shipping power.<\/p>\n
But catching up with China’s state-supported shipyards is a heavy lift.<\/p>\n
Last year, the U.S. shipyards built fewer than 10 commercial ships, while China’s turned out well over 1,000, military and industry analysts said.<\/p>\n
China over the last two decades has propelled itself to the No. 1 position globally and its biggest shipyards handle both commercial and military projects.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the U.S. Navy’s fiscal year 2025 plan said U.S. commercial shipbuilding has experienced a near-total collapse and called for the long-term revitalization of that industry to bolster Navy shipbuilding.<\/p>\n
MSC – the largest containership operator – placed orders for 12 of those vessels to be built in China since USTR announced the port fees in April this year, the CSIS report said.<\/p>\n
Switzerland-based MSC, like peers Hapag-Lloyd, Maersk and CMA CGM, has taken China-linked ships off U.S. trade routes, limiting or negating the new fees.<\/p>\n
HSBC analysts said China’s COSCO Shipping is most exposed with estimated 2026 port fees of $1.5 billion.<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump has been a cheerleader for U.S. shipbuilders, seeking alliances and investments from powerhouses like South Korea.<\/p>\n
(Reuters – Reporting by Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles; Editing by Marguerita Choy) maritime professional<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Global shipping companies are moving full steam ahead with commercial vessel orders from Chinese shipyards, despite the U.S. targeting those ships with port fees aimed at countering China’s maritime dominance, a new report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies showed. Chinese shipyards captured 53% of all global ship orders by tonnage during the …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":68030,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-68029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-maritime-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/68030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.al-sindbad.net\/rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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