According to analyses by the Bochum-based software company Setlog, the situation will not change until well after Christmas. The supply chain management experts forecast delivery delays, capacity bottlenecks and freight rates at a very high level until at least the Chinese New Year (end of January). The situation is expected to ease somewhat by Easter 2022 at the earliest. Setlog backs up its forecasts with figures. For analysis, the company evaluated data from around 100 brands using Setlog's SCM software OSCA from July 2019 to July 2021.

So far, the peak of the price explosion in sea freight from China to Europe was recently the transport of a 40-foot high cube container for which $20,000 was paid. In July, prices for containers from China to Western Europe hovered between 14,000 and 16,000 US dollars. Depending on the relation, shipping company and loop, this corresponds to six to eight times when compared to prepandemic prices.

Some companies have already reacted to the tense situation in global freight traffic. The heads of KiK and Rossmann predicted at the beginning of July that price increases would be coming in the retail sector. And economic experts are currently no longer ruling out the possibility that the inflation rate could temporarily rise to 4%.