Daily intel for cross-border sellers — products, policy, platforms, and the moves that work.
US Census released Q1 2026 Quarterly Retail E-Commerce Sales May 18: $326.7B for the quarter, +9.8% YoY versus total retail at +3.9% — the widest ecommerce-vs-retail growth gap in 5 quarters. E-commerce share is now 16.9%, up from 16.1% YoY, +2.7% QoQ. Seller insight: The structu…
Two member states moved ahead of the July 1 EU-wide €3/HS code duty with their own per-parcel fees. Romania: ~€5/parcel logistics fee since Jan 1, 2026. France: ~€2/unique item category since March 1, 2026. The Council also confirmed a separate €2 EU handling fee per HS code, liv…
Drewry's composite WCI rose 6% to $2,712/40ft for the week ending May 21 — its third consecutive May increase (gCaptain, May 22). The standout move was Asia-Europe: Shanghai → Rotterdam +15% to $2,773, Shanghai → Genoa +10% to $4,082, against just 3 announced blank sailings for t…
Austria intends to introduce a €2-per-parcel cross-border tax starting autumn 2026, applicable only to cross-border ecommerce sellers with annual revenue above €100M. The revenue will subsidize basic food tax reductions for domestic consumers — explicitly positioning the policy a…
USTR's Federal Register notice (**91 FR 24636**, published May 6, 2026) opens the comment portal at comments.ustr.gov for industry requests to continue the July 6, 2018, Section 301 action (List 1, $34B trade value, 25% duty) between May 7 and July 5, and for the August 23, 2018,…
