Fall In Container Spot Rates "Much Steeper", "Less Orderly" Than Expected Fall In Container Spot Rates "Much Steeper", "Less Orderly" Than Expected By Greg Miller of FreightWaves Shipping liner executives predicted a continued drop in spot rates during their latest quarterly calls, while offering soothing assurances to investors that the fall would be gradual. Maersk CFO Patrick Jany said it would be a “progressive erosion,” not “a one-day drop.” Matson CEO Matt Cox emphasized rates were “adjusting slowly” in an “orderly marketplace” and not “falling off a cliff.” The decline may indeed be fairly steady, as opposed to the sudden, violent swings seen in bulk commodity shipping. Yet spot container rates appear to be falling more rapidly than some liner executives expected. Stifel analyst Ben Nolan recently met with executives of Matson. “In our meetings, management indicated that … the downward softening has been much steeper and less orderly in the past two months,” Nolan wrote in a client note on Sunday. Matson introduced its third trans-Pacific service — China-California Express — in June 2021 to meet booming demand.