Container transshipment once again served as the main engine of the Mid-Atlantic port system in 2025, reaching 9.6 million TEUs, or approximately 52% of the 18.6 million TEUs handled across the country’s ports. Following the traffic peak recorded in 2024 as a result of attacks in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait and the mass diversion of vessels from the Suez Canal to the Cape of Good Hope route, the logistics map underwent a profound reconfiguration. As shipping lines reorganized their global networks, adjusted capacity and diversified port calls, the Port of Las Palmas emerged as one of the main beneficiaries, consolidating its position in the Atlantic in direct competition with Terminal XXI at the Portuguese port of Sines.
OPCSA’s Atlantic breakthrough
At the Canary Islands port, transshipment operations grew by 26.6% to approximately 939,000 TEUs at the end of 2025. MSC’s strong push from the OPCSA terminal propelled total container traffic at La Luz to 1.54 million TEUs. This historic figure enabled the Canary port to overtake a strategic Mediterranean hub such as Marseille in the European ranking, demonstrating the island port’s agility in capturing flows redistributed from the Mid-Atlantic and West Africa in competition with major mainland and Portuguese platforms.
Competition with the Portuguese giant
Las Palmas’s dynamism contrasted with the performance of the other Spanish hubs and with that of Sines’s Terminal XXI itself. At the Portuguese port, operated by PSA together with MSC and equipped with a 28-meter draft for megaships of more than 20,000 TEUs, overall volumes exceed 1.8 million TEUs, with transshipment accounting for more than 1.3 million. Nevertheless, Las Palmas managed to narrow the operational gap and gain greater weight within international value chains thanks to OPCSA’s equipment and its geographical advantage for regional interconnection services.
Stability in Algeciras and local strength in Valencia
For its part, the Iberian Peninsula reflected the volatility inherent in pure transshipment once the effects of the Red Sea crisis began to fade. Algeciras maintained its highly specialized profile with 4.1 million TEUs in transshipment—87% of its total traffic of 4.7 million—and modest growth of 0.3%. Valencia suffered a 7.4% decline in transshipment to 2.55 million TEUs, although it achieved 3.4% growth in overall traffic thanks to a 15.4% increase in its import and export market with the mainland hinterland.
Barcelona’s retreat and the outlook for 2026
Barcelona underwent the most severe adjustment after the report described its previous performance as “opportunistic” in the eyes of shipping lines. The Catalan capital saw its transshipment fall by 13% in 2025 to 1.5 million TEUs, losing the momentum of the 31.9% increase recorded in 2024, when it reached 1.7 million TEUs, and dragging total container traffic down by 4.1% as local cargo failed to offset the decline. The results confirmed how easily shipping lines shift operations between mainland and island ports depending on circumstances. In the first five months of 2026, the figures already showed a 2.8% recovery in national transshipment, driven by stability in calls by major operators.
The article MSC’s internal rivalry between Sines and OPCSA at the Port of Las Palmas was first published on canarymaritime.com.
