HK Stock Market Move | Shipping stocks generally rose in early trading, as China and the United States imposed port fees on each other. Institutions expect this to boost freight rates in the short term.

Shipping stocks rose across the board in the morning session, as of the time of writing, TS LINES (02510) rose by 3.9% to HK$8.53, COSCO SHIPPING Development (02866) rose by 3.6% to HK$1.15, OOIL (00316) rose by 2.68% to HK$126.3, SITC (01308) rose by 2.54% to HK$29.82, and COSCO SHIP PORT (01199) rose by 1.06% to HK$5.72. On the news front, on October 14th, the Ministry of Transportation issued the "Implementation Measures for the Collection of Special Port Dues for U.S. Ships." The "Measures" consist of ten articles and will come into effect from the date of release. They mainly include the basis for formulation, scope of collection, collection standards, collection entities, fee-paying voyages, payment requirements, information verification, violation handling, dynamic adjustments, interpreting departments, and implementation time, further clarifying the specific provisions that exempt ships built in China, only empty ships entering Chinese shipyards for repairs, and other ships identified for exemption from paying the fee. Huatai stated that on October 10th, the Ministry of Transportation issued an announcement in response to the USTR's imposition of port service fees on Chinese companies and ships built in China. The fee standards are basically consistent with the U.S. policy, and reciprocal port fees between China and the U.S. will take effect from October 14, 2025. In the short term, the agency believes that shipping companies may redeploy global ship deployments and port calls to reduce related costs, causing disruptions to the supply chain and pushing up freight rates.