Preliminary global industry data for May support the widespread anecdotal reports of a continued small recovery of air cargo volumes, but a fall in demand over the last two weeks of the month “may signal more challenging times ahead as airlines return capacity to the market”, according to data specialist CLIVE.

Although air freight tonnages flown for the full month were higher in May than in April, the dip in the final two weeks “may be a cause for concern”, CLIVE noted in new analysis published today.

Although volumes in the first two weeks of May grew by 3.6% and 5%, respectively, week on week, volumes in the final two weeks dropped by 1.9% and 5.1%, week on week, respectively.

“Having only recently stated that the global air cargo industry had stabilised, but was by no means in good shape, the latest week-by-week analyses by CLIVE Data Services for May unfortunately pinpoints a slightly deteriorating condition as the month progressed,” the company said.

CLIVE highlighted that May was “not as bad for the global air cargo industry as April”, confirming that, “as hinted in CLIVE’s data last month, the industry has passed the (initial) bottom”. After reporting a 37% decline in volumes, year on year, in April, the corresponding figure for May of -31% “shows a slight upward curve and, measured alongside a capacity decline of -42% versus last year, the pressure on capacity remained high”, CLIVE noted.

Consequently, CLIVE’s ‘dynamic loadfactor’, based on both the volume and weight perspectives of cargo flown and capacity available, increased month-on-month from 67% to 69%.

“But, just as March and April were a story of two tales, so is May,” the report noted. “March ended far worse than it started, while for April it was the other way around.

“Looking at the most recent weeks, it is clear that May ended weaker than it started. After a series of week-over-week growth in volumes, a decline set in during the week of May 18-24, followed by an even stronger decline for the last week of May.”

During these last two weeks of May, CLIVE noted that “the capacity growth rate versus the previous week was higher than the volume growth, ther

Source:lloydsloadinglist