VIDEO: U.S. indicts Chinese container manufacturers on price fixing charges

At a press conference laced with expressions like “Chinese cartel” and “Chinese bad actors,” the U.S. Department of Justice yesterday revealed that seven Chinese executives and four of the world’s largest shipping container manufacturing companies have been indicted for conspiring to restrict the output of — and fix the prices of — nearly all of the world’s standard unrefrigerated shipping containers for over four years, from as early as November 2019 to at least January 2024, in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act.

“Global price-fixing cartels strike at the heart of our economic liberty. The defendants held hostage the world’s supply of ocean shipping containers during the COVID pandemic when our supply chains needed it the most. They stole from everyday Americans who paid more and waited longer for vital goods as a result,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Omeed A. Assefi of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.  The multi-year conspiracy roughly doubled the prices of standard shipping containers between 2019 and 2021, increasing the container manufacturers’ profits approximately one hundredfold during the COVID-19 pandemic and global supply chain crisis. One executive, Vick Nam Hing Ma, has been arrested and his extradition to the United States is pending. Six executive co-defendants remain at large.

Defendant Vick Nam Hing Ma, also known as “Vick Ma”, 54, a Chinese national, was employed by Singamas Container Holdings Ltd. as marketing director. He was arrested on April 14, 2026, in France,
Following Ma’s arrest, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California unsealed today a superseding indictment charging Ma and 10 of his co-conspirators for conspiring to restrict the output of—and fix the price of — nearly all the world’s standard unrefrigerated shipping containers (also known as standard dry containers), the intermodal containers which carry billions of dollars of goods across the oceans to American households each year. In total, the superseding indictment charges 11 defendants, including 10 of Ma’s co-conspirators:

The companies named in the indictment are: Singamas Container Holdings Ltd. (Singamas), a publicly traded company, organized and existing under the laws of Hong Kong in the People’s Republic of China; China International Marine Containers (Group) Co., Ltd. (CIMC), a publicly traded company, organized and existing under the laws of the People’s Republic of China; Shanghai Universal Logistics Equipment Co., Ltd., a company organized and existing under the laws of the People’s Republic of China, doing business as a brand of shipping containers called Dong Fang International Containers, also known as “DF”, “DFIC”, or Dong Fang and CXIC Group Containers Co. Ltd. (CXIC) a company organized and existing under the laws of the People’s Republic of China.

The individuals named are: Siong Seng Teo, 71, employed by Singamas as chief executive officer and chairman and believed to be a resident of the Republic of Singapore. Boliang Mai, 67. From August 2015 through July 2020, Mai served as president and chief executive officer of CIMC. From August 2020 through the rest of the period covered by the Superseding Indictment, he served as chairman and CEO of CIMC. Mai is believed to be a resident of the People’s Republic of China. Tianhua Huang, 62, was employed by CIMC as vice president. Huang is believed to be a resident of the People’s Republic of China. Yongbo Wan, 47, was employed by CIMC as general manager of CIMC’s Operation Management Center. Wan is believed to be a resident of the People’s Republic of China.  Qianmin Li, 62, was employed by Dong Fang as general manager. Li is believed to be a resident of the People’s Republic of China and  Yuqiang Zhang, 49, also known as \ “James Zhang,” was employed by CXIC as CEO. Zhang is believed to be a resident of the People’s Republic of China.

As alleged in the superseding indictment — which also makes reference to two companies identified only as “co-conspirator company A and co-conspirator B —as early as March 2019, several of the conspirators began discussing a scheme to restrict the output and fix the prices of standard dry shipping containers. On or about Nov. 14, 2019, Yongbo Wan and Tianhua Huang of CIMC, Qianmin Li of Dong Fang, Yuqiang Zhang of CXIC, and a co-conspiring executive of co-conspirator company A met at CIMC’s headquarters in the city of Shenzhen. The goal of the agreement was to raise the price of standard dry shipping containers. To do so, they agreed to restrict CIMC’s, Dong Fang’s, CXIC’s, and co-conspirator company A’s output of standard dry shipping containers by various means, including: Limiting the number of shifts and hours that each production line for standard dry containers could run per day; Installing 87 video surveillance cameras on all 49 dry container production lines to ensure that the companies did not exceed the agreed-upon limitations; Not building any new container manufacturing factories; and establishing a fund that included a mechanism to penalize financially any cheating on the output-restriction agreement.

The participants contemplated that Singamas and co-conspirator company B would join the output-restriction agreement later. Those companies did so by at least as early as March 2020.

Throughout their conspiracy, the conspirators refined the operation of the output-restriction agreement. By September 2020, the conspirators agreed to restrict how many standard dry shipping containers the company conspirators would manufacture for particular customers. These customers included major U.S.-based container lessors, shipping lines, and logistics companies, in addition to container lessors, shipping lines, and logistics companies based in Europe, the People’s Republic of China, and elsewhere. And, from at least as early as September 2022 until at least as late as November 2023, the conspirators agreed to cap the total cargo volume of containers that the company conspirators produced. On or about November 20, 2023, for example, Vick Ma of Singamas co-presented to his CEO, co-defendant Siong Seng Teo, the conspiracy’s “total allowable capacity” and “allowable quota” for production — organized by each company conspirator and its factory lines.

As further alleged in the indictment, the profits of CIMC’s container manufacturing business segment increased nearly one hundredfold from about US$19.8 million in 2019, to about US$288 million USD in 2020, to about US$1.75 billion in 2021. Singamas’s net income weny from a loss of about US$110 million in 2019, to profits of about US$4.6 million in 2020 and about US$186.8 million in 2021.

The superseding indictment charges the defendants with a conspiracy in restraint of trade in violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act (15 U.S.C. § 1). A violation of the Sherman Act carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $1 million criminal fine for individuals, and a maximum penalty of a $100 million fine for corporations. The fines may be increased to twice the gain derived from the crime or twice the loss suffered by the victims of the crime if either amount is greater than the statutory maximum fine.