Hai Phong Boxes Hold Firm. Demand Softens. Same Mill Week

Hai Phong to the US West Coast still clears at a $7,185 planning bar per 40ft this week. Hai Phong to the US East Coast sits at $9,587. Those are Vinawood’s public bars for formwork buyers booking from Vietnam’s home port — not soft forwarder promos, and not a Chinese-origin print dressed up as a Vietnam lane.

Drewry’s World Container Index held flat at $4,465 per 40ft on 3 September. Asia–Europe softened (Genoa $4,368, −10%; Rotterdam $4,092, −5%). Transpacific capacity stayed tight: six blank sailings flagged for the week ahead, twice the prior week. Panama’s Neopanamax cut to nine daily slots is live. Soft demand does not cancel a hard box out of Hai Phong.

Our 31 August brief said a one-percent composite dip was not a cheaper Q4 box. This week the composite barely moved and the US legs out of Vietnam still price at the high bar.

Hai Phong first. Then the vessel.

Vinawood plans public freight from Hai Phong. When a marketplace HPH print sits under the matching Drewry Asia-coast floor, we use the higher figure. That keeps US West Coast planning at $7,185 and East Coast at $9,587 for this week’s brief. Phaata’s HCM VCFI on 4 September (USWC $7,467 / USEC $9,867) sits in the same band and supports treating northern Vietnam as at or above that floor — not two thousand dollars cheaper.

We’d treat soft NVO cards that undercut those floors as internal noise, not as the number you put on a PO. A US East Coast or Gulf importer of film-faced plywood is still buying the expensive lane. A European buyer sees a softer ocean print on Drewry’s Genoa and Rotterdam legs. Neither lane is a free pass on mill lead time.

Panama is nine Neopanamax slots a day

The Panama Canal Authority cut Neopanamax daily slots to nine from 3 September. Panamax slots sit at 25, then 23 from 15 September. Drewry’s same note put early-September daily transits at 34, then 32 later in the month, with Neo-Panamax capped at nine. Official canal advisories tied the cut to reduced watershed rainfall. Ships without a reservation wait. US East Coast and Gulf strings that still use the canal feel that first.

Full containerships get priority in Neopanamax allocation. Auction competition stays high when demand exceeds the nine-slot day. Extra lead time on the PO is cheaper than a rolled box after stuffing.

Reliability is the other line item

Sea-Intelligence put global schedule reliability at 56.4% in July, down 6.1 points month on month — the softest month of 2026 so far. Late ships were delayed just over six days on average. Asian port congestion drove most of the slide. That is a network factor on feeder and mainline handoffs. It is not a reason to swap Hai Phong for a Chinese POL on your worksheet.

A rolled formwork lot is an expensive lot even when Europe’s ocean tariff looks softer than August.

US housing soft. EU construction dipped. The box is not.

US housing starts fell to a 1.239 million seasonally adjusted annual rate in July, down 12.4% from June, per the Census Bureau and HUD release on 18 August. Construction spending fell 0.5% in July to a $2.16 trillion pace, KPMG summarised on 1 September, with private residential leading the drop.

Eurostat’s 20 August release put June production in construction down 1.3% month on month in the euro area and 1.0% in the EU. Soft end-use demand does not cancel an East Coast Hai Phong box at $9,587. Formwork for commercial pours and infrastructure still needs a vessel week. Price the ocean line and the wait as separate rows.

AD/CVD is live. Formwork scope is not blanket

The USITC issued an affirmative injury finding on 19 August for hardwood and decorative plywood from China, Indonesia, and Vietnam (Inv. 701-TA-764-766 and 731-TA-1747-1749). Commerce will issue AD and CVD orders. Softwood structural plywood was terminated as negligible. The public report is due by 28 September.

Commerce’s Vietnam final AD, applicable 21 July, put a 90.12% weighted-average dumping margin on listed producers and the Vietnam-wide rate, with a subsidy-offset cash deposit of 84.95% once the ITC affirmative is published in the Federal Register. Critical circumstances were negative for Vietnam.

For a formwork buyer, the line is product scope, not a 90% headline on every Vietnam sheet. In scope: hardwood and decorative plywood. Out of scope: PS 1 / PS 2 certified structural plywood, and qualifying Phenolic Film Faced Plyform (opaque phenolic film ≥90 g/m² permanently bonded on both face and back, plus opaque moisture-resistant edge coat). A decorative panel with a film coat is not the same as that Plyform exclusion.

FOB Vietnam stays a dollar invoice

Most FOB Vietnam contracts settle in dollars. The State Bank of Vietnam set the daily reference rate at 25,611 VND per USD on 7 September, up 6 VND from the prior session, VietnamPlus reported. Vietcombank opened near 25,875 buy and 26,255 sell. A European buyer converting euros into that invoice feels FX even when mill FOB holds and the Rotterdam box eases.

Keep glue class off the freight worksheet. Phenolic Class 3 / EN 636-3 product such as Pro Form belongs on exterior or long wet-storage pours. Form Extra is a higher-melamine-content MUF panel in the EN 636-2 envelope and is not Class 3. A cheaper Europe box does not change the bond.

What to do this week

For US West Coast out of Hai Phong: plan against the $7,185 public bar and confirm the origin week before you chase a softer promo. For US East Coast and Gulf: lock space against $9,587 and the live Panama nine-slot day. For Europe and the Mediterranean: use the softer Genoa and Rotterdam prints to negotiate the ocean line, then confirm Hai Phong stuffing week and inland delivery the same day.

Place the mill production week first. Then the vessel. Then stuffing. A soft Europe tariff and a hard US tariff can sit on the same mill week. The buyer who books only the ocean line is the one who gets rolled.

About Vinawood

Vinawood is a Vietnamese plywood manufacturer established in 1992. The mill ships more than 5,000 containers a year to 55+ export countries across Asia, the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Australia, with film-faced and formwork panels built on a documented production process and individual sheet inspection. Core certifications include ISO 9001, FSC-COC, PEFC, EN 13986 CE marking, and EPA TSCA Title VI for US-bound orders. Wood is plantation-grown. For Q4 and Q1 formwork enquiries, request a quote.