After grounding its fleet of six Boeing 747-400ERFs on Dec. 31 due to depressed demand, Jade Cargo International has officially shut down. The liquidation of the Chinese carrier - of which Shenzhen Airlines, Lufthansa Cargo and German investment firm DEG hold a 51-percent, 25-percent and 24-percent stake, respectively - comes on the heels of numerous capacity cuts in the Asia-Pacific region.

U.S. rail shippers don't appear to be heeding the warnings of a national economic slowdown. Intermodal volume in May on the major U.S. railroads hit the highest level in history for that month, according to the Association of American Railroads. Intermodal traffic last month was 3.5 percent higher than the same month a year ago. Although carload volume was down 2.8 percent year-over-year in the same period, the big losses were because of slumps in the major commodities of coal and grain.

In international trade news, import cargo volume at the nation's major retail container ports is expected to increase 4.8 percent in June compared with the same month last year, and year-over-year increases are expected to continue into the holiday season shipping cycle, according to the monthly Global Port Tracker report released by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates.