USWC Historic Shares of U.S. Containerized Trade

Although the U.S. Commerce Department has resumed publishing monthly foreign trade statistics, it has yet to catch up with real time. So, data on the weight and value of the U.S. containerized maritime trade in October 2025 were not made public until January 8, 2026.

The October numbers testify to the abrupt fall-off from a year earlier in container traffic through USWC ports relative to ports elsewhere in the country. In October 2024, the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach enjoyed a combined share of containerized import tonnage that topped their share in pre-pandemic October 2019. The latest figures show the two San Pedro Bay ports with a slightly smaller share than they held six years earlier. The year-over-year declines from October 2024 were even more pronounced in the export side of the nation’s container trade ledger.

Reflecting the turbulence in trade with China, the October share figures show particularly dramatic fall-offs in the USWC shares of America’s containerized trade with China.

In addition to showing that USWC ports have been ceding shares of the nation’s containerized marine trade to ports on the East and Gulf Coasts, the numbers also demonstrate the extent to which container traffic through the nation’s Pacific Coast ports is being consolidated at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in Southern California.