Container handling through the Californian ports of Long Beach, LA and Oakland rose 3.4% year over year in April. That masked a weak performance from exports which dropped for a sixth straight month by 6.7%. The export decline likely reflects China’s retaliatory tariffs – China represented 30.9% of outbound containers in the past 12 months – and may worsen given the May 10 escalation in the tariff war. Imports from China are likely to take a further step down. Imports are already in decline with China-to-California shipments down 13.2% year over year. That hit Cosco Shipping and Maersk h...