SCFI is the abbreviation of Shanghai Containerized Freight Index that shows the fluctuation of spot freight rates of export container transport market in Shanghai.

The freight rates of individual routes of SCFI show the spot ocean freights and related maritime surcharges.

The ports of destination are the base ports of the route, e.g. Mediterranean Sea—Barcelona/Valencia/Genoa/Naples, Europe—Hamburg/Antwerp/Felixtowe/Le Havre, USWC—Los Angeles/Long Beach/Oakland, USEC—New York/Savannah/Norfolk/Charleston, West Japan—Osaka/Kobe, East Japan—Tokyo/Yokohama

The surcharges are composed of: BAF/FAF, EBS/EBA, CAF/YAS, PSS, WRS, PCS and SCS/SCF/PTF/PCC. THC at both ends, port facility security surcharge, South China place of origin surcharge, US automatic customs declaration charge, inland on-carriage charges, etc. are not included.

The freight rate unit is USD/TEU and for US east and west coasts, USD/FEU is applied.

Trade and transport term: export CIF, CY—CY

Container type/cargo description: general dry cargo container, and for US east and west coasts, general cargo is applied.

1) Different geographic scope: SCFI composite index reflects the export container market in Shanghai with the freight rates of individual routes showing port-to-port freight level; CCFI composite index reflects China’s nationwide export container transport with the indices of individual routes showing the ups and downs of the entire shipping routes.

2) Different target market: SCFI targets at the spot rates of Shanghai export container transport market, which is more sensitive and seasonable; CCFI targets the overall freight level (including spot and long-term rates) of China’s export container transport market, which is more comprehensive and macroeconomic.

The sample data for SCFI calculation are collected from the panelists of CCFI, including liner companies, consignors and freight forwarding enterprises. All panelists of CCFI panel are world-renowned enterprises or those who have outstanding performance and good fame in a certain field. Click the following URL for the name list: http://www.chineseshipping.com.cn/yunjia/index/yunzhi51_list.htm

Arithmetic mean is applied in calculation of SCFI freight rates of individual routes. The composite index is calculated by weighting average. The basis period of composite index is 16th October, 2009 and the basis index is 1,000 points.

SCFI is publicized at 15:00 Beijing Time on the date of publication.

The date of publication is generally each Friday, which is adjusted according to statutory holidays. The specific dates of publication will be decided and made known to public by Shanghai Shipping Exchange.

	Freight Filing	Freight Index
Purpose	Regulating market	Communicating market information
Principals and scope	All liner operators and NVOCCs	15 liner companies and 15 NVOCCs/forwarders voluntarily joining the panel
SSE role	Freight filing accepting organ	Freight index compilation and publication organ
Content of freight rates	Tariff rates and the contractual rates beyond the tariff rates	Evaluation of spot rates of weekly space-booking rates with definitive route, basic ports, type of container, price term, pricing criteria, etc.
Characteristics of freight rates	Rates to be executer that may be changed	Rates of transaction concluded
Reporting time	Filing of tariff rate one month in advance; filing of contractual rate 24 hours in advance	Before 12:00 Beijing Time of each index publication date; time and frequency fixed
Processing of information	No processing at all	Calculation of freight indices according to prescribed rules

SSE sets up full and complete freight filing confidentiality mechanism and freight index confidentiality codes; these two projects are run by two mutually independent departments; different systems of freight filing and freight index are developed, which are strictly separated in terms of rules, management, personnel and information system.

Users may visit the official websites of Shanghai Shipping Exchange www.sse.net.cn and Chinese Shipping Website http://www.chineseshipping.com.cn to see the freight indices.

Shanghai Shipping Exchange owns the intellectual property rights of SCFI, CCFI and CBFI. Without authorization in writing by SSE, all relevant data of SCFI are for perusal only. No entity or individual is allowed to duplicate, forward, transfer, revise, distribute, publicize or extract, republish or reuse for any public or commercial purpose.

Subscribers to freight indices can log on to www.sse.net.cn and http://www.chineseshipping.com.cn by username and password to get the most updated freight indices and the history data of the past three years.

Non-subscriber may see the most dated composite indices of SCFI and CCFI but publication of spot rates of individual routes are postponed a bit later.

Non-subscriber cannot get the history data of freight indices.

Index subscribers are divided into three categories: common user, broker and others. Common user may read the data but is not allowed to distribute. Please click “Subscription Agreement for Common User”. Broker refers to the user that uses SCFI as clearing benchmark of container freight swap transaction. Others refer to users other than the common user and broker. Common user can follow the “subscription process” while broker and others may contact us directly.

The subscription fee of SCFI and CCFI of common user is CNY15,000/year and discount is given to subscription of two or more indices, i.e. 40% off for the second indices, e.g. if a client subscribes both SCFI and CCFI, the total sum will be CNY24,000/year.

Yes, different discounts will be offered to SSE members according to their membership levels.