Geopolitical Shocks and the Resilience of Supply Chains Across Eurasia — An Event Study Analysis of Spatio-Temporal Transmission Effects Based on the China-Europe Railway Express Network

Abstract

In September 2025, a sudden border closure between Poland and Belarus brought operations at Malaszewicze—a key hub for the China-Europe Railway Express—to a standstill for approximately 12 days, triggering a series of chain reactions, including a sharp drop in freight volume and a surge in freight rates. This paper adopts the “time-lagged transmission effect” as its core analytical framework and employs the event study method. Based on monthly operational data from March 2025 to February 2026, it systematically examines the short-term impact of this sudden shock on the freight volume and freight rates of the China-Europe Railway Express, as well as the patterns of its attenuation. The study found that: (1) During the period of the shock, the number of departures in the high-exposure group (Xi’an, Zhengzhou, Chongqing) fell by 19.2%, and logistics costs per container surged by 17.4% (with the freight rate index peaking at a 22% increase within two weeks), exhibiting the typical characteristics of an “acute shock”; (2) The decline in freight rates exhibited a distinct asymmetric pattern of “rapid initial decline followed by gradual recovery”—approximately 60% of the total recovery was achieved within the first four weeks, with a half-life of about 2.5 weeks; however, the remaining 40% of the recovery took 22 weeks, and nearly 12% of the cargo volume was permanently lost after the “time threshold” in the fourth week; (3) The intensity of the shock decreased progressively along network distance from near to far, but the recovery speed diverged in the opposite direction—core hubs recovered in about 4 weeks, while distant nodes required more than 10 weeks, constituting a “spatio-temporal coupling” of temporal rhythm and spatial pattern; (4) Repeated shocks have fostered “adaptive expectations,” shortening the physical-layer response time from a “monthly” scale in 2022 to a “weekly” scale in 2025. However, baseline risks have risen simultaneously, resulting in a net effect of “shorter short-term windows and thicker long-term residuals.” This paper reveals the temporal propagation patterns of sudden node-based geopolitical shocks along the China-Europe Railway Express network, providing empirical evidence for the design of emergency response mechanisms and the diversification of transport corridors.