Real-time economic intelligence provider, QuantCube Technology, today announced that it has added three new real-time economic indicators to the QuantCube Macroeconomic Intelligence Platform – tracking congestion in three of the biggest ports in the world: Shanghai, Los Angeles/Long Beach and Rotterdam. The QuantCube Port Congestion Indicators aim to provide an early signal about problems in global supply chains.

QuantCube combines real-time geolocation of the merchant fleet using AIS data with its own proprietary mapping of the anchorage zones to measure the number of vessels in anchorage waiting for a berth in these ports, as well as the average time spent by these vessels in the anchorage zones before berthing. The indicators are updated daily and calculated as a 7-day average to even out any difference in activity levels over weekends.

Spikes in the Port Congestion Indicators can suggest local pressures, such as local authorities closing or restricting activity at a port due to Covid-19 restrictions, strike activity, storms or other disruption. A sustained increase in the indicators can signal systemic tensions in global and regional supply chains. The data can be used to guide short-term strategies on freight rates and the long-term rebalancing of portfolios against inflationary risks.

“Customers that already use QuantCube’s Global Trade data to understand changes in international trade, commodity trade, crude oil sentiment and automotive exports have been asking for greater insight into port congestion. The existing indicators in this space from other providers simply don’t provide the combination of granularity and timeliness required, with detailed information typically only updated weekly or monthly,” explained Thanh-Long Huynh, CEO of QuantCube. “A daily update is crucial for users operating investment strategies in this space – as the timeliness of the data is crucial in helping them spot trends ahead of the market.” 

The new set of QuantCube indicators are available through QuantCube’s Macroeconomic Intelligence Platform, which also provides real-time indicators for inflation, tourism, global trade, and key macro-economic variables. The indicators fill a gap in the market for hedge funds, asset managers and investment banks that are hungry to receive granular insights about port congestion on a daily basis. Longer term, QuantCube also plans to provide indicators covering other major ports around the world.

Huynh added: “Our new Port Congestion Indicators can provide additional insight when combined with our other economic indicators. For example, when we plotted the Port Congestion Indicators for Shanghai and Los Angeles/Long Beach together on a chart and overlayed the US CPI indicator, we were able to see that elevated congestion in the port of Shanghai in Q3 of 2021 had a knock-on effect in impacting global supply chains – leading to congestion in the port of Los Angeles/Long Beach in Q4 of 2021. This in turn helped to feed inflationary pressures, contributing to the rise of the US CPI index.”