Seaborne Car Trade: 32 million cars and 8% growth projected for 2025
LONDON: The annual review of the car carrier sector from Clarksons Research, Car Carrier Trade & Transport 2025, has been released onto Shipping Intelligence Network.
Summarising the report, Steve Gordon, Managing Director of Clarksons Research, commented: “2025 has been a mixed year for the car carrier sector, with charter and asset markets correcting (though still firm by historical standards), operator earnings and freight rates remaining resilient, and trade volumes ‘outperforming’ expectations despite US tariffs. Highlights from the latest report include:
- Global seaborne car trade volumes projected to grow by a robust 8% to 32.1m cars in 2025
- Chinese car exports on track to grow ~30% to a record 6.2m cars, while US car imports are set for a ‘modest’ ~7% decline despite tariff impacts
- Car imports into a range of key developing regions seeing rapid growth in 2025, with Africa and Latin America projected to see their strongest car imports in a decade, while Middle East imports (+11% to 3.4m cars) are set to hit a new record;
- Electric Vehicles (EVs) are set to account for ~15% of global seaborne car trade in 2025
- Car carrier fleet is experiencing a phase of significant growth, with 13% fleet expansion for 2025 projected driven by record newbuild deliveries of ~570k ceu
- Charter market trending lower through 2025, but seems to have found a floor recently: our 1 year TC rate for 6,500 ceu PCTC stood at $42,500/day in November, down 63% from early 2024’s exceptional highs but still double the pre-Covid 10 year average
- Car carrier newbuild ordering has slowed markedly, with just 6 vessels of 22,000 ceu ordered in 2025 so far, down from an average of 500,000 ceu p.a. across 2021-24, while secondhand asset pricing has eased
- Fuelling transition progress continues in the sector, with 1m ceu (~20% of total fleet capacity) now alternative fuel capable
- A range of demand scenarios possible ahead (e.g. sustaining strong growth in Chinese exports uncertain, any return to normal levels of Red Sea / Suez Canal transits would reduce shipping demand), our base case outlook is for trade growth to cool to 2-3% next year against 7% fleet growth.
The latest edition of this market leading report includes coverage of car carrier charter markets, car industry and seaborne car trade trends, trends in the car carrier fleet, asset and newbuilding market trends, and market supply-demand projections.
Shipping Intelligence Network (SIN) is Clarkson Research’s market leading digital platform and the most comprehensive source of data on shipping and trade. The system provides immediate access to uniquely powerful data and analysis tracking and projecting market supply / demand, freight, vessel earnings, vessel values and macro-economic data around trade flows and global economic developments.
About Clarksons Research
Clarksons Research, the data and analytics arm of Clarksons, are the market leaders in the provision of independent data and intelligence around shipping, trade, offshore and the maritime energy transition. Millions of data points are processed and analysed each day to provide trusted and insightful intelligence to thousands of stakeholders across maritime. Better data for better decisions.