The Panama Canal is so congested that one ship owner just paid a record $4 million to skip to the front of the line

Japan’s Eneos paid $3.975 million at auction to jump the queue. That sits on top of regular transit fees that run hundreds of thousands more. A drought shrank the canal’s capacity, and the Panama Canal Authority turned the shortage into a bidding war. Scarcity is the best business the canal has ever had.