September 18th, 2025 – Major container lines are set to remove nearly half of their China-built vessel capacity from U.S. services by October, helping them better absorb the Trump administration’s new fee on U.S. port calls by shifting to non-Chinese ships.
Despite Washington’s attempt to weaken China’s dominance in global shipbuilding, the country’s yards look set to weather the disruption.
Xeneta data shows eight of the largest ocean carriers deployed about 566,000 TEUs of Chinese-built capacity on U.S. rotations this year. By October, roughly half will be replaced with non-Chinese vessels as the U.S. Trade Representative begins collecting the new fee. Carriers have faced the challenge of reshuffling fleets to comply with “place-of-build” restrictions, often at the expense of optimal service profiles.
Cosco Shipping and its Hong Kong-based affiliate OOCL remain the most exposed, with 296,000 TEUs of Chinese-built capacity on U.S. services. As Chinese-owned carriers, they cannot avoid the fee. Sources indicate Cosco does not plan to add fee-related surcharges for its U.S. shippers.
CMA CGM has the next largest exposure, with 107,000 TEUs of Chinese-built capacity, but is swapping out 42,000 TEUs by redeploying larger Chinese-built ships to Europe and South America. CMA CGM has also said it will not apply surcharges. Evergreen Marine, with only four Chinese-built vessels in its global fleet, is unlikely to be significantly impacted and may help fill gaps within the Ocean Alliance.
Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd are also acting, removing about 60,000 TEUs of Chinese-built capacity from their Gemini Cooperation trans-Pacific services between August and October. Both are expected to absorb the changes without passing costs to customers. Mediterranean Shipping Co. has trimmed about 19,000 TEUs of Chinese-built capacity, while Ocean Network Express (ONE), which once had a third of its post-Panamax ships built in China, now deploys only one small Chinese-built vessel on US services. Partners Yang Ming and HMM have negligible exposure.
Concerns over fees on Chinese-built vessels led to a sharp slowdown in orders at Chinese yards earlier this year. An August report from S&P Global Ratings noted orders in the first half of 2025 were set to fall 54% year over year, particularly in the first quarter when the original fee proposal was released.
But orders have since begun to recover, with S&P estimating only about 9% of total U.S. port calls in 2024 would be affected. China’s lead in shipbuilding appears secure, as South Korean and Japanese yards face capacity and labor constraints, leaving China likely to maintain its global dominance for the next two to three years.
