Cargo number projections appear as if they will show a modest uptick over the coming months, Port of Los Angeles Executive Director Gene Seroka told harbor commissioners this week but uncertainty remains for the rest of 2025 — with tariffs still looming on the horizon.

Those remarks, which came during the Board of Los Angeles Harbor Commissioners meeting on Thursday, June 12, echoed those of National Retail Federation officials and Port of Long Beach CEO Mario Cordero earlier this week.

In May, Seroka said, there were 17 cancelled sailings, followed by 10 cancellations so far this month. But there likely will be more of those to come in June, he said.

Last week, Seroka said, only five cargo ships a day came into port, when normally that number would be 10 or 12 daily this time of year.

For dockworkers in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, the downturn has been felt.

On one day last week, Seroka said, only half of the workers who went to the hiring hall received work — and “the others went home.”

“For the next two weeks, we’ll see more normal (ship) arrivals,” Seroka said, with some 125,000 cargo containers — or twenty-foot equivalent units, the standard unit of measurement in the shipping industry — projected to arrive this week and a 131,000 projected for next week.

That’s normal for June, he said.

Importers are “scooping up” products that have now been manufactured, Seroka said, but “we don’t see a large surge of cargo coming our way just yet.”

And the tariff uncertainties, he cautioned, are far from over.

The National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates said earlier this week that import cargo at the nation’s major container ports can expect to see a rebound through summer, with retailers taking advantage of a 90-day reduction in tariffs that were recently imposed on China. The projections were based on the Global Port Tracker report released on Monday, June 9, by the National Retail Federation and Hackett Associates.

While some have predicted a summertime “surge,” Seroka said that has sometimes been overstated.

Jonathan Gold, the National Retail Federation’s vice president for supply chain and customs policy, has expressed optimism about the summer months ahead based on their most recent projections.

“This is the busiest time of the year for retailers as they enter the back-to-school season and prepare for the fall-winter holiday season,” he said in a statement this week.

“Retailers had paused their purchases and imports previously because of the significantly high tariffs,” he added. “They are now looking to get those orders and cargo moving in order to bring as much merchandise into the country as they can before the reciprocal tariff and additional China tariff pauses end in July and August.”

But the back-and-forth tariff drama is far from over, Seroka has noted, with more discussions to come on trade policies through the rest of the year.

Port of Long Beach CEO Mario Cordero said this week he was “cautiously optimistic,” noting that peak season — when fall goods begin to arrive — may see modest cargo upticks.