Normally, thousands of container ships are carrying merchandise across the Pacific Ocean. Admittedly, the trade is skewed heavily in an eastward direction, with Asian goods coming to North America. But at least there are ships at sea moving product when the world economy is humming along. Right now, for the first time ever, there is not a single container ship at sea in the Pacific. Or the Atlantic. Or the Indian Ocean. All such ships are in port.
Shipping Said to Have Ceased…
Is the Worldwide Economy Grinding to a Halt?”
By Jeff Berwick
“Last week, I received news from a contact who is friends with one of the biggest billionaire shipping families in the world. He told me they had no ships at sea right now, because operating them meant running at a loss. This weekend, reports are circulating saying much the same thing: The North Atlantic has little or no cargo ships traveling in its waters. Instead, they are anchored. Unmoving. Empty.
You can see one such report here. According to it, “Commerce between Europe and North America has literally come to a halt. For the first time in known history, not one cargo ship is in-transit in the North Atlantic between Europe and North America. All of them (hundreds) are either anchored offshore or in-port. NOTHING is moving. This has never happened before. It is a horrific economic sign; proof that commerce is literally stopped.”
When the world economy was booming, construction was going strong and high demand had the price of commodities – oil, copper, iron ore, etc – at record highs not that many years ago. The price paid for shipping was also at a record high. The benchmark index for world shipping rates is the Baltic Dry Index:
rom a peak of over 10,000 before the economic crash of 2008, the index (BDYI) is at just 310, having fallen 97% from the peak, and falling over 35% just so far in 2016.
What this means is no one wants to ship merchandise right now. The least horrific potential reason is that the global economy is collapsing, and there is simply no demand for goods and no expectation of making money trying to sell such goods.
But what if the truth is even worse? Shipping is controlled by a few dominant billionaires. If one of them were told that something significant were about to happen, such as:
WWIII is imminent
A plague is breaking out
a huge earthquake/tsunami is predicted soon
or a variety of other things, then they might keep all ships in port for a while.
I hope it is just systemic economic collapse; something I’ve been predicting and expecting to unfold no later than spring 2016
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