by the Associated Press on Monday<\/a>, said that the current cease fire in the region is on \u201clife support\u201d following the administration\u2019s rejection of the latest responses to U.S. proposals by Iran.<\/p>\nEven with a sustained peace agreement in place, Seroka said, reopening the strait will require a gradual process before there is a return to normal traffic.<\/p>\n
Tariffs also remain on the table and continue to shift, the port leader said, further affecting global trade.<\/p>\n
Seroka\u2019s guest on Monday was former Ambassador Katherine Tai, who served as U.S. Trade Representative during the Biden administration.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere will be tariffs for the foreseeable global future,\u201d she said, \u201cbut at which countries at which rates?\u201d<\/p>\n
More clarity is needed in U.S. trade policy, Seroka said.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust tell me the ground rules,\u201d he said. \u201cThe folks \u2014 not just in the executive suites but who we work with every day \u2014 tell me their planning horizon is so narrow because they don\u2019t know what to expect now, what shoe is going to drop.\u201d<\/p>\n
Still, Seroka said of the Port of L.A., \u201celevated (cargo) numbers remain steady so far this year; we\u2019re looking pretty good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Consumers, he said, are continuing to spend.<\/p>\n
Higher gas prices \u2014 which, Seroka said, is impacting truckers at the port and are also expected to affect summer vacation travel plans \u2014 are a concern, having surpassed $6 a gallon in Southern California. There are efforts on the part of big oil companies, he said, to find alternative supplies to the 30% of oil that has relied on traveling through the war-impacted strait. The port also supplies airline fuel to Los Angeles International Airport.<\/p>\n
But cargo traffic should be fine in the immediate future.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re really going to go into an abyss,\u201d Seroka said. \u201cCargo looks good; we\u2019re not seeing cancellations.\u201d<\/p>\n
The summer months should see the usual fall and holiday seasonal items flow in, he said.<\/p>\n
But overall, import volumes at major U.S. container ports are expected to remain below last year\u2019s level into early fall, \u201cdespite a skewed year-over-year bump in May and June,\u201d National Retail Federation said last week.<\/p>\n
That analysis came rom the federations\u2019 Global Port Tracker report, which the NRF and Hacket Associates released on Friday, May 8.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe numbers show a year-over-year increase for the next two months, but that\u2019s only because of the sharp fall-off in imports after \u2018Liberation Day\u2019 tariffs were announced in April 2025,\u201d Jonathan Gold, NRF vice president for supply chain and customs policy, said in a written statement accompanying the numbers. \u201cWith inflation rising and consumer confidence falling among global economic uncertainty driven by the conflict in Iran, the overall trend of lower imports is expected to continue after that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Amid what is an ongoing economic uncertainty, Hackett Associates founder Ben Hackett, said retailers also have been cautious about building up inventories.<\/p>\n
\u201cContainerized imports in the first quarter were down year over year, and forward demand is weakening,\u201d Hackett said in a written comment. \u201cStalling re-stocking efforts and rising geopolitical tensions are increasingly clouding the outlook.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Port of Los Angeles, meanwhile, processed 890,861 twenty-foot equivalent units, or TEUs, in April. That was 5.7% above the same month last year and marked the second-best April on record, port officials said, with strong import demand continuing despite the uncertainty around tariffs and trade policy.<\/p>\n
Through the first four months of 2026, the port has handled 3,279,704 TEUs, 2% ahead of its five-year average for the period and 2% below last year\u2019s pace, which was driven by significant front-loading of cargo.<\/p>\n
\u201cApril was our strongest month this year and the highest cargo volume we\u2019ve seen since last August, a clear sign that the American consumer remains resilient,\u201d Seroka said at the media briefing. \u201cRetailers and manufacturers are continuing to move goods despite uncertainty, and based on what we\u2019re seeing in Asia, the next wave of imports \u2014 from back-to-school to early holiday merchandise \u2014 is already beginning to build.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tai, who recently founded the Coalition for New Trade<\/a>, said changes are likely ahead \u2014 and needed \u2014 when it comes to global trade.<\/p>\n\u201cThe world economy, geopolitics and trade are different today than they were 10 years ago,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd they will continue to change; we\u2019re in the middle of a huge inflection point.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tai served as the 19th United States trade representative and was a member of President Joe Biden\u2019s cabinet as the principal trade advisor and negotiator. She also served as spokesperson on U.S. trade policy from March 2021 to January 2025.<\/p>\n
Both Seroka and Tai also spoke about the importance of this week\u2019s anticipated meeting between Trump and his Chinese counterpart, President Xi Jinping.<\/p>\n
The meeting will be closely watched for \u201chow the two largest economies in the world deal with each other,\u201d Tai said.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody has presumed that prosperity will lead to peace,\u201d she said. \u201cI think it\u2019s fair to say that the world is less peaceful.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fate of the Strait of Hormuz, however, remains the focus for the world\u2019s shipping industry, Seroka said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s going to take confidence and we\u2019re just not there yet,\u201d he said of the ongoing stalemate. \u201cWe\u2019re seeing just a trickle of the normal activity,\u201d which is some 110 ships moving through a day. \u201cThere\u2019s less than a handful moving through now.\u201d<\/p>\n
There are now about 20,000 seafarers still on vessels inside the Arabian Gulf, waiting for what comes next, Seroka added.<\/p>\n
\u201cCompanies are going to remain cautious,\u201d Seroka said of an eventual reboot of normal ship traffic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cargo numbers remained strong at the Port of Los Angeles in April, Executive Director Gene Seroka said on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":109190,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[5564,102,37595,12243,21024,42,37594,101,12508],"class_list":{"0":"post-109189","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-strait-of-hormuz","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-hormuz","10":"tag-long-beach","11":"tag-los-angeles","12":"tag-los-angeles-county","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-port-of-los-angeles","15":"tag-strait-of-hormuz","16":"tag-uncategorized"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116558439581626395","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109189\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109190"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}