The U.S. supply chain is in the throes of a so-called \u201cbullwhip effect.\u201d Importers overreacted to last year\u2019s congestion and heightened consumer demand, brought in too much cargo too early, and are now stuck with excess inventory. Could there be a bullwhip effect in the opposite direction next year?<\/p>\n
It could happen, says Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd. He addressed this scenario during a panel discussion Monday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is still a lot of volatility in the market, and everybody seems to be doing the same thing, which is quite scary,\u201d said Habben Jansen.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody is overreacting all the time. At the start of COVID, we lost 20% of our volume in two weeks because everybody started cutting their orders. Then the economy recovered and everybody started ordering like crazy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year we saw lots of people\u00a0ordering Christmas stuff in the summer. So, a lot of volume was brought forward. Now we see\u00a0congestion easing, inventories filling up and warehouses filling up and everybody is cutting orders like crazy. We\u2019ve gone to the other extreme.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just waiting for the next step,\u201d he said. \u201cBecause I\u2019m pretty sure what we\u2019re seeing right now is an overreaction \u2013 again. People trying to cut everything possible at this stage will see that underlying consumer demand is actually relatively healthy and all of a sudden, they\u2019ll become concerned that their inventories are a bit on the low end and we\u2019ll possibly see a bounce-back.\u201d<\/p>\n