Super Dispatch, an end-to-end software platform for the auto transport industry, has released new data from its Fuel and Transport Cost Tracker detailing the impact of rising fuel prices on carriers, brokers and shippers. 

According to the company’s latest update on May 1, while national average diesel prices have eased slightly to approximately $5.35 per gallon, they remain more than $1.80 higher than the same week last year.

Diesel outlook

The pricing pressure comes amid growing warnings of a potential supply crisis. While retail diesel prices recently surged nearly 29 cents in a single week to $5.64 per gallon, inventories are falling even as demand declines.

S&P Global Energy analysts warn that the full severity of supply disruptions – largely linked to blockages in the Strait of Hormuz – is yet to come. 

SuperDispatch’s report highlights a significant shift in how fuel costs are flowing through to transport pricing. Auto transport costs have risen by 16.7% from pre-conflict levels, with the seven-day average price per mile climbing to $0.98.

In a recent interview with FreightWaves, Super Dispatch CEO Matt Bradley explained that fuel accounts for roughly 25% of a carrier’s cost structure. 

“In a world where diesel prices go from $3.50 to $5.50 or higher quite quickly, what are [carriers] doing? Are they just eating that cost? Are they passing on the cost?” he said.

The data thus far suggests a “shared pain” model. While diesel is up roughly 37–46% from pre-conflict levels, load prices have plateaued at an 11% increase. This indicates that carriers are not passing on the full weight of increased fuel costs to shippers, resulting in margin compression across the board.

Tools for navigating fuel costs

To help industry professionals manage this volatility, Super Dispatch developed the Fuel and Transport Cost Tracker. 

“It’s our goal to make sure the industry transparently knows what’s going on,” Bradley said. “Fundamentally, period, full stop: this is what is happening. The data is the data.”

The tracker uses up-to-date normalized data from real accepted offers on the Super Dispatch platform – filtering for factors like single-VIN orders and 500–1,000 mile moves – to isolate comparable trends.

Super Dispatch also offers a Pricing Insights tool that pulls live market rate data by lane, and is preparing to launch its SuperCard credit card designed to give carriers access to exclusive fuel discounts to further offset pump costs.

The post Super Dispatch: Diesel price volatility strains auto transport margins appeared first on FreightWaves.

Expeditors International did well in the air in the first quarter, but not as well on the open seas.

In a quarterly earnings report that was overall strong, the difference in shipments as measured by weight was stark.

Airfreight tonnage in kilos at Expeditors (NYSE: EXPD) rose 7% in January, 7% in February and 3% in March, for an overall gain of 5% compared to the corresponding quarter of 2025.

The ocean freight performance was the inverse. As measured in forty foot equivalents, volume fell 2% in January, 7% in February and 4% in March, for an overall decline of 4% compared to 2025’s first quarter.

Expeditors does not conduct an earnings call with analysts. But its prepared statement on its earnings has relatively extensive commentary from its management team.

CEO Daniel Wall said airfreight margins in the first quarter were stronger than in the fourth quarter of 2025. 

The higher per-kilo profitability resulted, Wall said, “from higher rates and a more stable balance between sell and buy pricing for the first two months of the quarter, as air capacity was less constrained until the conflict in the Middle East began.”

The increase in air tonnage featured demand from technology customers, who provided strong demand, Wall said.

Imbalance in the ocean

As for ocean freight, “the imbalance of global capacity versus demand, which we began to see in the latter half of 2025, continued to impact the ocean industry and led to a decline in our ocean revenues.”

Volume was not the only component that declined in the quarter for ocean freight, Wall said. Pricing was down too. “We were impacted by lower average profitability per-container and volume, primarily on exports from Asia,” according to Wall. “However, with favorable buy rates and disciplined cost control, we partially offset top-line pressure.”

The earnings announcement singled out the company’s performance in customs brokerage. “Higher entry volumes and complexity, along with tariff-related activity, drove revenue increases in our customs brokerage business,” Wall said. “In addition, disciplined cost control and pricing increases led to higher gross margins, both sequentially and year-over-year. 

Expeditors benefitted from the fact that its cost of securing transportation rose 2%, but its revenues were up by 4%.

Bottom line was improved

It was squeezed by salaries which rose 9% from a year earlier. But that was not enough to offset other strong areas and operating income rose 11% to $294.8 million from $265.8 million. Diluted earnings per share rose to $1.71 from $1.47 a year earlier.

Expeditors’ stock rose on the earnings announcement. At approximately 1:45 p.m. EDT, Expeditors was up $8.47 to $148.18, a gain of 6.06%.

According to SeekingAlpha, the consensus forecast on the company’s EPS was 37 cents less than where it came in at $1.71. Revenue of $2.78 billion beat the consensus forecast by $160 million. 

The stock is up about 31.5% in the last 12 months. Its 52-week high of $167.19 was set on February 3.

Expeditors is a company that has continued to add headcount. It climbed to 20,361 in the first quarter from 19,203 a year earlier. Employment in every region listed by Expeditors rose; only corporate headcount declined over the course of the 12 months. 

In the prepared announcement, CFO David Hackett said the “strategic investment in headcount (was) aimed at higher-growth opportunities, particularly in customs brokerage, as well as essential investments in technology, including artificial intelligence. “

“We are starting to achieve benefits from these investments, which are helping to drive our productivity gains,” Hackett said.  

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The cargo carrier will reintroduce a weekly Boeing 777 freighter service to the Iraqi capital from Doha on May 7. Qatar Airways will operate twice weekly passenger flights to Baghdad, starting May 10. The flights will also carry cargo. 

With the resumption of passenger and freighter services, Qatar Airways Cargo will offer a combined cargo capacity of more than 127 tons per week in each direction.

Qatar Airways Cargo has spent the past five weeks restoring its freighter network after the U.S. and Israel attack on Iran led to the temporary closure of regional airspace and airports, disrupting air traffic throughout the Gulf region. Most aircraft continue to use designated flight corridors to avoid rocket risks.

Freighter destinations have increased to more than 60 as of May 1, while the passenger network is scheduled to reach more than 150 destinations by June 16. 

Qatar Airways is the largest non-express cargo airline in the world and has a fleet of 30 Boeing 777 cargo jets.

In related news, Qatar Airways Cargo has signed a contract with Worldwide Flight Services to provide ground handling for its 777 freighter aircraft and shipments at Liège Airport in Belgium. As of last Friday, WFS is providing ramp and warehouse services for Qatar freighters arriving from Doha and other international markets.

Liège Airport saw strong cargo growth last year, with tonnage rising 14% to 1.45 million tons. The upward trend continued in the first quarter, with the airport reporting a 15.6% year-over-year boost in volumes and a 7% increase in aircraft movements. 

Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.

Write to Eric Kulisch at ekulisch@freightwaves.com.

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Negotiators for DHL (XETRA: DHL) and the Teamsters reached a tentative collective bargaining agreement on March 29 under threat of a strike. The previous contract expired on March 31. 

The new national master agreement includes a 20% wage increase, higher health and welfare contributions and job protections. It also establishes strong safeguards against AI-controlled routing systems that the union says undermine seniority and explicitly prohibits the use of autonomous vehicles that threaten jobs, according to the Teamsters.

“DHL Teamsters were prepared to take action and hold management accountable if they failed to deliver,” said Teamsters General President Sean O’Brien, in a statement. “Our members were ready to shut this company down if it failed to live up to its obligations, and management knew it. That leverage delivered serious wage increases, locked in strong job protections, and made it clear that Teamsters will not allow technology to undermine our rights or livelihoods.”

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The new corporately owned office and transportation yard is designed to handle over-the-road, intermodal, air and ocean shipments while supporting both cross-border and intra-Mexico services, the company said.

Company executives say the move reflects a broader structural shift in how MODE manages freight across North America.

“This isn’t just a new office — it’s a structural shift for us in how we manage our cross-border freight,” Jason Roberts, MODE Global’s senior vice president of digital enablement, told FreightWaves in an interview.

MODE has historically relied on local partners to handle freight movements inside Mexico. Opening its own facility allows the company to bring those operations in-house — a move aimed at reducing handoffs, improving visibility and strengthening security.

“The expansion is not just for the sake of a footprint. It’s about control, visibility and security, most importantly, in cross-border freight,” Roberts said.

The company said limiting handoffs between multiple providers can reduce inefficiencies and lower the risk of cargo theft — a persistent concern for shippers operating in Mexico.

MODE’s approach also aligns with broader industry trends, as logistics providers shift toward more integrated, tech-enabled networks rather than fragmented brokerage models.

Why Puebla? 

MODE selected Puebla for its first Mexico office based on a mix of customer demand and its position within key transportation networks.

“From a customer standpoint, there was a direct need that made a lot of sense for us,” Roberts said. 

He added that Puebla offers a unique intermodal advantage, allowing MODE to integrate rail and trucking services more effectively than in traditional border hubs.

Unlike congested border crossings, Puebla provides access to inland manufacturing centers without the bottlenecks typically associated with cross-border freight corridors.

The office opened April 15 and is already supporting a major automotive customer, according to the company.

While cross-border freight has long been a core business, MODE is seeing growing demand for domestic shipping within Mexico — a trend tied to nearshoring and post-pandemic supply chain shifts.

“Cross-border out of Mexico is not a new need as much as intra-Mexico,” Roberts said. “The accessibility now is there.”

Shippers have increasingly looked to diversify supply chains after disruptions during the pandemic, with Mexico emerging as a key manufacturing hub.

Roberts said advancements in technology — particularly around tracking, visibility and data — have made it easier for companies to operate within Mexico, lowering barriers that previously discouraged some shippers.

Cargo theft and fraud remain top concerns for logistics providers operating in Mexico, and MODE is positioning its Puebla office as a way to mitigate those risks.

By deploying its own people, processes and technology — including GPS tracking and electronic logging capabilities — the company aims to create more consistent oversight across shipments.

“Everything is about people, process and technology. And now it is our people, our process and our technology that we will enable that with,” Roberts said.

He also pointed to the importance of local relationships, noting that carrier selection and trust-based partnerships remain critical in the Mexican freight market.

A broader North American strategy

MODE executives say the Puebla office is likely the first step in a broader expansion across Mexico, though future growth will depend on execution and market demand.

“I’m confident that when this works well that we’ll probably look at some other hubs,” Roberts said.

The company is aiming to build what it describes as a “center of excellence” in Puebla before scaling to additional locations.

MODE Global operates more than 200 offices across the U.S. and Canada and works with over 100,000 carriers and agents across North America.

CEO Lance Malesh said the Mexico expansion comes at a time when the logistics industry faces mounting pressure but also new opportunities tied to shifting global supply chains.

“This new office strategically positions MODE Global for new markets and gives us the ability to extend our service to local customers in the region,” Malesh said in a statement.

The post MODE Global bets on Puebla to unlock Mexico freight growth  appeared first on FreightWaves.

The Logistics Managers’ Index—a diffusion index in which a reading above 50 indicates expansion, while one below 50 signals contraction—returned a 28.4 reading for transportation capacity in April. That was 10.9 percentage points lower than the March reading and the second-fastest rate of decline captured by the dataset in its nearly 10-year history. (The highest rate of decline was recorded in September 2020 at “the kick-off of the first pandemic peak season.”)

Transportation prices (95) were up 5.6 points in the month. April marked the second-fastest growth rate for pricing. At a spread of 67 points, the two indexes have never been further apart.

“Taken together, this means that we have never before tracked the transportation metric getting simultaneously tighter or more expensive,” the Tuesday report said. “Freight markets were already on a strong upward trajectory coming into 2026, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and subsequent increase in fuel costs have supercharged these movements.”

While “the capacity crunch is being felt everywhere,” it is more pronounced for large companies (over 1,000 employees) and at upstream firms (manufacturers and wholesalers). “These differences likely reflect the stock up happening at manufacturers and wholesalers as they attempt to compensate for increased fuel prices through freight consolidation,” the report said.

Transportation utilization (69.6) increased 6.7 points to the highest reading since November 2021. Upstream companies returned a 76.1 reading, which was 21 points higher than downstream retailers.

Logistics managers surveyed expect the transportation market to remain very tight over the next 12 months, returning future readings of 33.2 for capacity, 74.5 for utilization and 93.9 for pricing.

All-in logistics costs surge again

The overall LMI stood at 69.9 in April, up 4.2 points sequentially and the highest reading since April 2022. The “continued expansion in the freight market” drove the change.

Inventory levels (56.3) increased 1.5 points, with most of the build occurring in the back half of the month. Inventory costs (74.7) dipped 1.5 points in the month, but continued “to increase at a rapid pace.” Costs were 7 points higher for small firms, “which may have less flexibility with moving orders around and consolidating shipments due to their lower economies of scale.”

The warehousing market tightened again.

Warehouse capacity (45.5) contracted as utilization (64.4) expanded 4.6 points, pushing warehouse prices (72.7) up 5.3 points and into “significant expansion” territory. These metrics also showed tighter conditions at the upper levels of the supply chain.

Aggregate logistics costs (inventory, warehousing and transportation) stood at 242.4, the fastest rate of expansion since April 2022.

“Supply-driven inflation is more difficult for the Fed to combat than demand-driven inflation because higher interest rates cannot create greater supply (in some cases they actually may hinder supply),” the report cautioned. “If logistics costs remain elevated, it is likely there will be at least some inflation.”

The LMI is a collaboration among Arizona State University, Colorado State University, Florida Atlantic University, Rutgers University and the University of Nevada, Reno, conducted in conjunction with the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals.

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The sharp reversal in the benchmark price of diesel this week is being accompanied by growing warnings of a potential coming crisis in supplies that so far has been mostly avoided through the use of inventories.

The Department of Energy/Energy Information Administration weekly average retail diesel price surged 28.9 cents/gallon to $5.64/g. With this increase, the price used as the basis for most fuel surcharges has now regained virtually all of the decline recorded over the last three weeks. The DOE/EIA price was $5.643/g on April 6. That was the post-war high. With this week’s increase, it is now just 3/10 of a cent less than that. 

The latest price increase comes even as it has not had a chance to fully reflect gains in the futures market. Ultra low sulfur diesel on the CME commodity exchange for June delivery settled at $3.7943/g on April 27, the recent low water mark. On Monday, May 4, just five trading days later, it settled at $4.0723/g, 27.8 cts/g more than that, as the early April ceasefire was increasingly falling apart and there was little relief from blockages in the Strait of Hormuz. 

The latest jump in prices in futures and at the retail level is coming as some analysts are predicting that conditions for consumers are more likely to get worse before they get better.

S&P Global Energy, in a recent analysis, said the oil market now features two things that theoretically should not happen in parallel: a decline in inventories and a drop in demand.

As S&P Global Energy said in the analysis, those “seemingly contradictory developments occurring in tandem shows that the full severity of the greatest supply disruption in history is yet to come.”

Biggest fall in demand since COVID

The demand decline in the second quarter is expected to total about 5-million barrels/day off a base of 103- to 104-million barrels of global demand, according to S&P. It’s the largest decline since COVID hit in 2020. That collapse in consumption was likely to have been as much as 20-million b/d.

As a result of the second quarter decline, and possibly more beyond that, global petroleum liquids demand (a figure that includes such products as propane and biofuels) is likely to decline by 2-million b/d this year, S&P Global said. Declines in that number on an annual basis are extremely rare; it fell about 8 million b/d between 2019 and 2020 because of the pandemic, but has been positive since then. 

Even as demand is falling, the S&P Global Energy report said April had a “record-settling decline in global crude inventories.” That decline was about 6.6 million b/d and will average about 5.5 million b/d for the quarter, S&P Global Energy said.

“While there have been significant impacts to date, the oil market has remained somewhat cushioned from the full impact of the loss of 15 million barrels per day in supply,” Jim Burkhard, S&P Global Energy’s vice president and global head of crude oil research, said in the report. “That the cumulative supply loss is now approaching 1 billion barrels is a staggering figure that inventories cannot cover indefinitely. An inevitable market reckoning is coming.” 

No immediate relief from a strait opening

Reopening the Strait of Hormuz would not produce immediate relief, the report said. 

“S&P Global Energy expects that, if Hormuz were to be reopened, it would take an additional seven months at minimum to fully restore upstream production, assuming no permanent damage and supply chains operate smoothly,” the report said. “A recovery could take longer if there is damage to ports or other transport and loading infrastructure. The longer the strait remains closed, the more likely the supply crisis extends into late 2026 and into 2027.”

Burkhard’s warning to consumers was ominous. “What is a tremendous curtailment of demand is still being outstripped by the loss of supply,” he said. “That means that higher crude oil and refined product prices are still to come.”

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Tradepoint Atlantic and Terminal Investment Ltd. broke ground on the Sparrows Point Container Terminal, a 168-acre marine box hub and on-dock rail facility. The partners say the project is the first U.S. container terminal in decades to be privately financed.

Tradepoint Atlantic since 2014 has been redeveloping the 3,300-acre site of a Bethlehem Steel mill southeast of Baltimore’s city center as a shipping and logistics center. TIL is co-managed by leading ocean liner Mediterranean Shipping Co. of Geneva and U.S.-based Blackrock (NYSE: BLK), the world’s largest private equity firm. 

The partners plan to spend $1.2 billion to develop the 168-acre terminal and on-dock rail, which they hope to plug into an I-95 East Coast doublestack network offering direct connections to the Midwest, as well as eastern seaboard destinations. It will have annual capacity of more than 1 million containers, with berthing for two ultra-large container vessels and seven ship-to-shore cranes.

The terminal’s first berth is to be completed by 2028, with full build-out in 2030. It is located opposite TPA’s bulk handling terminal.

The May 1 groundbreaking ceremony comes just months after CSX (NASDAQ: CSX) completed clearance work for doublestack trains on Baltimore’s Howard Street tunnel. The century-old route had been a chokepoint for intermodal trains, but reports on social media said doublestack traffic through Baltimore began moving this week.

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Yi, a naval reserve officer who holds a merchant mariner’s license, most recently served as deputy administrator of the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration (MARAD). Yi served in various staff positions in the U.S. House of Representatives for almost a decade and a half. 

Yi is the most recent maritime official from the second Trump administration to move to the private sector. In 2025 former Marad chief Louis Sola and longtime chief of staff Mary Thien Hoang joined lobbyist Thorn Run Partners.

“Through his extensive experience in both the Executive and Legislative branches of government, Sang is a proven leader who understands the critical role ports play in driving economic vitality and safeguarding national security,” said Chett Chiasson, chairman of the AAPA board and Port Fourchon (La.) executive director, in a release. “The Board has full confidence in his ability to lead AAPA, enhance our industry’s interests, and strengthen the collective voice of ports across our country.”  

Yi is a graduate of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, earned an  M.A. in National Security and Strategic Studies from the U.S. Naval War College, and a law degree from George Washington University.

“I am honored to lead AAPA. Our ports are vital gateways that advance America’s competitiveness,” Yi said in the release. “This is a critical time for the maritime industry, and investment in America’s ports has never been more crucial. I look forward to working with AAPA’s Board and membership to represent the ports and companies that are the backbone of the supply chain and produce countless jobs across the Americas.” 

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According to the latest U.S. Bank Freight Payment Index even as shipper spending rose in the first quarter, shipment volumes remained relatively flat dipping 0.3% quarter over quarter.

“This is a market being reshaped by supply, not demand,” said American Trucking Associations Chief Economist Bob Costello in a statement, noting that fewer trucks competing for freight — rather than a surge in volumes — is driving higher rates and costs.

Shipment volume rose 0.6% year over year during the first quarter, while shipper spending surged 12.9% from Q4 2025 and 21.8% annually — the largest sequential increase since the pandemic-era freight boom.

The U.S. Bank index report points to a supply-side shift after a prolonged freight recession dating back to mid-2022. Capacity tightened significantly during the quarter as smaller fleets and owner-operators faced rising operating costs, particularly fuel, forcing some to exit the market or idle equipment.

Pricing power returned to carriers during the first quarter. According to the U.S. Bank National Spend Index, carrier pricing power climbed to 216.7, while the shipments index remained relatively subdued at 75.9, highlighting the growing disconnect between demand and costs.

The Midwest led all regions in both volume and spending growth, while the Southwest and Southeast saw declines in shipments but still posted double-digit increases in shipper spending — underscoring how widespread the capacity squeeze has become.

Fuel prices amplify pressure on shippers

Fuel played a critical role in accelerating freight costs late in the quarter. Diesel prices surged sharply in March, including what the report describes as the largest weekly increase on record, with prices rising nearly $1 per gallon in a single week.

That spike translated directly into higher fuel surcharges, adding another layer of cost pressure for shippers already contending with tightening capacity and rising contract and spot rates.

From a FreightWaves SONAR perspective, the national average retail diesel price (DTS.USA) has climbed above $5 per gallon. 

Sustained diesel prices at this level tend to accelerate carrier exits at the margin, particularly among smaller operators with limited access to credit, reinforcing the tightening capacity environment seen in the U.S. Bank data.

While the U.S. Bank index highlights relatively flat shipment activity, SONAR data suggests underlying demand remains resilient.

The Truckload Tender Volume Index (STVI.USA), which measures shipper demand, is currently running approximately 11% to 13% higher year over year. 

That aligns with the report’s characterization of stable — but not surging — freight volumes, with demand holding steady even as supply contracts.

This dynamic — steady demand paired with shrinking capacity — is a classic setup for upward rate pressure, helping explain why spending is accelerating much faster than shipment growth.

Spot rates rose nearly 12% quarter over quarter, according to DAT data cited in the report, while contract rates also moved higher, narrowing the spread between the two.

For shippers, the shift creates a more challenging planning environment. Costs are rising quickly without the typical demand signals that would normally accompany a tightening market.

“What makes this quarter stand out is how abruptly costs moved higher even though freight activity itself didn’t,” Bobby Holland, director of freight business analytics at U.S. Bank, said in a statement.

The post Freight costs spike in Q1 as diesel tops $5: U.S. Bank index appeared first on FreightWaves.

Grocery delivery is a big business by itself, but it’s also important for Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) as a driver of online merchandise purchases that are delivered through its traditional parcel network. The spread of temperature-controlled last-mile delivery means Amazon has perfected its logistics system for profitable distribution at scale, which helps it compete with other retailers that offer fresh grocery delivery without building stores. At the same time, grocery and restaurant delivery services like DoorDash and Uber Eats have migrated into the last-mile package delivery space.

The news comes one day after Amazon unveiled Amazon Supply Chain Services, a go-to-market initiative that packages existing, standalone logistics services into a managed end-to-end capability. 

In December, Amazon reached its target for same-day delivery of groceries in 2,300 cities and towns, more than doubling its previous reach. Amazon is now offering businesses such as offices, schools and gyms that need fresh and frozen food to serve employees, customers and guests, the ability to order perishable groceries alongside essential supplies they already purchase in a single-cart checkout, and receive all their items the same day.

Amazon, the second-largest grocer in the United States with more than $150 billion in gross sales, said it plans to expand fresh grocery delivery to even more areas this year.

“We’re continuously innovating to make business buying simpler, faster, and more cost-effective for our customers,” said Shelley Salomon, vice president Amazon Business, in a news release.”

Orders are delivered within set delivery hours and preferences. At checkout, customers can select delivery windows that align with their business operating hours, ensuring fresh groceries arrive when they are available to receive and store perishable items properly.

Amazon Business takes advantage of Amazon’s temperature-controlled fulfillment network to ensure perishable items stay fresh. Amazon also offers a freshness guarantee on grocery deliveries.

For Business Prime members, same-day delivery is free for orders over $25 in most areas. If an order doesn’t meet the minimum, members can still get same-day delivery for a $2.99 fee. For customers without a Prime membership, the service is available with a $12.99 fee, regardless of order size.

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At first glance, the carriers appear legitimate. Their operating authorities are active in federal databases. Insurance filings remain on record. From the perspective of a broker or shipper running a routine verification check, the company looks no different than thousands of other active carriers moving freight across the country. The issue is not what appears in the system. It is who is actually operating behind it.

where control is actually lost

Investigators say criminal groups are exploiting this gap by taking control of existing motor carrier authorities through informal sales, unauthorized transfers or compromised credentials. Once in control, they begin booking shipments under the appearance of a legitimate trucking company. The authority clears standard checks. The people using it may have no connection to the original business.

On April 29, The Bannon Report published a cargo theft alert on LinkedIn. Within 24 hours, additional incidents surfaced tied to the same authority. The reports appeared unrelated at the time. When the data was connected, the pattern was clear.

Once a load is secured, the operation can shift quickly. Drivers change. Equipment changes. Communication channels begin to break down. Phone numbers stop working. Dispatch emails disappear. Trucks that appeared at pickup can no longer be located. In some cases, shipments vanished within hours with no confirmed sightings of the equipment involved. In others, trucks appeared briefly and then dropped off transportation intelligence platforms that normally capture commercial vehicle activity across the country.

the authority is not the operator

The tactic works because freight verification often centers on the authority itself. Brokers and shippers check federal registration, operating status and insurance filings. If those records appear valid, the carrier is cleared to move the load. These checks confirm the authority is active. They do not confirm who is controlling it.

If the authority has been transferred or compromised, the freight may already be in motion before anyone realizes the people behind the dispatch emails or phone calls are not connected to the original company. Investigators say this reflects an evolution in organized cargo theft. It builds on tactics such as carrier impersonation, double brokering and fraudulent dispatch operations. Using a legitimate authority adds credibility. It allows bad actors to move more freely through standard screening processes.

Online listings advertising motor carrier authorities are easy to find. Some are promoted as a faster way to enter the trucking industry without starting a company from scratch. Many transactions may be legitimate. Others appear to occur without proper filings or verification of who is assuming control. For criminal groups looking to obtain freight, that creates a clear opening.

Cargo theft continues to rise across the United States. Organized groups target shipments that can be quickly resold through secondary markets. Electronics, food products, consumer goods and industrial materials are common targets tied to freight fraud schemes. Investigators say the use of acquired or compromised authorities may make these crimes harder to detect and connect across the industry.

In a system built on trust between shippers, brokers and carriers, company identity is becoming another point of exposure. Nothing about it looks unusual on the surface. That is the point. That is how the load gets taken.

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Executives at Continental Tire say the shift reflects a broader transformation in how fleets manage one of their most overlooked cost centers: tires.

“This is really a hot topic these days, especially considering what’s going on with oil prices,” Renato Sarzano, head of truck tires for the Americas at Continental Tire, told FreightWaves in an interview. “Everything you can do to basically run more efficiently is on the spot.”

Continental’s ContiConnect platform — which uses embedded sensors to monitor tire pressure and temperature in real time — is part of a growing ecosystem of telematics and predictive maintenance tools being adopted by fleets.

The technology allows fleets to track tire performance across trucks and trailers, either through yard-based systems or real-time telematics integrations.

“What we are trying to do today is to help fleets to manage whatever is related to tires in a more professional way,” Sarzano said.

The push comes as fleets face mounting pressure from fuel volatility, maintenance costs and tighter margins. Tire pressure alone can have a significant impact on fuel efficiency.

“We made kind of a test with one big fleet in the U.S. — if you go from 94 PSI to 110 PSI, you gain 1.3 miles per gallon of fuel saving,” Sarzano said.

Despite those gains, adoption remains relatively low across the industry.

“If I look at the number of trucks running, and the number of trucks that are really connected somehow measuring pressure and temperature is really, really low,” he said.

Continental Tire is part of Continental AG, a global automotive supplier headquartered in Hanover, Germany. The company operates across key markets in North America, Europe and Asia, supplying tires and mobility solutions to both original equipment manufacturers and the replacement market.

Adoption uneven across North America

Continental is seeing adoption grow rapidly, though uptake varies by region.

Canada currently leads in adoption on a per-fleet basis, followed by the U.S., while Mexico is still developing.

“Canada is the highest number today for us. U.S. is second… Mexico is a little bit behind,” Sarzano said.

In Mexico, lower adoption is often tied to tighter margins and different purchasing behaviors among fleets.

“The difference in Mexico is that the tire controls are less accurate than here in the U.S. on average,” Sarzano said. “Fleets… buy cheap stuff just because they know they’re going to lose it.”

However, Sarzano said fleets that adopt premium tires and monitoring systems ultimately see lower total operating costs — a shift that could drive future adoption.

Mexico’s growing role in tire supply chains

At the same time, Mexico is becoming increasingly central to North America’s tire manufacturing network.

Over the past several years, tiremakers have expanded production capacity across Mexico to better serve U.S. demand, shorten supply chains and improve logistics efficiency.

Facilities across central and northern Mexico are now integrated into broader North American production strategies, supporting both original equipment and replacement tire markets.

This nearshoring trend allows manufacturers to respond more quickly to demand shifts while reducing reliance on overseas imports.

Fuel costs and tariffs reshape outlook

Looking ahead, Sarzano said the commercial tire market will continue to be shaped by macroeconomic pressures — particularly fuel and raw material costs.

“Tires are very much related to oil prices,” he said. “If the oil price stays where it is, there’s going to be basically a cost impact that will have to be transferred to the market.”

That dynamic creates a double hit for fleets, which face both higher diesel costs and rising tire prices.

At the same time, trade policy has also influenced the market. Sarzano noted that tariffs on imported tires created volatility in recent years, though Continental’s U.S.-based production has helped insulate it from some impacts.

As fleets navigate rising costs and operational complexity, tire performance is emerging as a key lever for efficiency.

Sarzano said the biggest opportunity for fleets today is straightforward: better tire management.

“The very basic mistake is air pressure,” he said. “It’s very basic.”

With fuel savings, safety improvements and longer tire life all tied to proper pressure, the industry is increasingly turning to automation and real-time data to close the gap.

The post Tire tech emerges as hidden lever for fleet efficiency in North America  appeared first on FreightWaves.

The numbers on cross-border carrier intelligence say something that the political framing around this issue consistently obscures. The Mexican-domiciled carrier population, specifically the carriers domiciled in Tamaulipas, performs at a level that would not be tolerated in the domestic carrier population. And the financial consequences of tolerating it in the cross-border population are landing directly on American carriers, owner-operators, and drivers who compete against that labor market every day.

Start with the inspection data because it is the most straightforward measure. In the last 365 days, Mexican-domiciled carriers conducted 121,199 roadside inspections, resulting in 395,026 total violations. That is 3.26 violations per inspection. Over the same period, Canadian carriers conducted 51,703 inspections and issued 53,964 violations, for an average of 1.04 violations per inspection. The US domestic carrier baseline runs significantly below two per inspection. Mexican-domiciled carriers are running at more than three times the Canadian rate. That gap does not exist because of aggressive targeting. Enforcement personnel do not selectively target Mexican carriers with extra scrutiny at the roadside. The violations-per-inspection rate is what it is because of the actual condition of the equipment and the drivers being inspected.

Breaking it down further, of the 395,026 violations from Mexican carriers in the last year, 208,826 were vehicle violations and 36,383 produced vehicle out-of-service orders. Roughly one in six vehicle violations resulted in a truck being put out of service on the spot. Driver violations totaled 25,996, with 3,183 driver out-of-service orders. Hazmat violations totaled 1,853. Compare that to Canadian carriers, who generated 15,449 vehicle violations and 5,897 vehicle out-of-service orders from fewer total inspections, with 10,226 driver violations and 1,215 driver out-of-service orders.

Now look at where Mexican carrier risk is actually concentrated, because this is where the conventional narrative about border-crossing areas gets complicated.

The common assumption is that El Paso and Tijuana are the locus of cross-border trucking risk. That assumption is wrong according to the data. Tamaulipas-domiciled carriers, the corridor running from Nuevo Laredo through Reynosa to Matamoros along the Gulf Coast of Texas, represent 2,377 of the 5,901 Mexican carriers registered with FMCSA. For context, the second-highest Mexican state in the dataset is Sonora at 60.8, followed by Chihuahua at 52.6. The highest-scoring Canadian province in the dataset is Alberta, with a score of 37.2. The Tamaulipas average is nearly double Alberta’s and nearly double the US domestic baseline, which sits around 33 on the same model.

That is a structural difference and it has a geographic explanation that the data supports and that independent research confirms. States like Veracruz, Puebla, Nuevo Leon, Jalisco, and Tamaulipas together accumulated over 700 million Mexican pesos in damages linked specifically to heavy truck crashes in 2024. In states with heavy freight intensity like Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Tamaulipas, the share of human-factor-related crashes, including distraction, fatigue, improper overtaking, and loss of control, rises above 85 percent, and in some corridors above 90 percent.

Tamaulipas is also cartel territory. The Gulf Cartel and Cartel del Noreste have contested control of the Nuevo Laredo and Reynosa corridors for years. Members of an organized crime group set at least four trucks on fire in Reynosa in 2022 to pressure truckers to end a blockade of the Pharr international bridge, a demonstration of the degree to which organized crime directly influences commercial trucking operations in the state. The carriers domiciled in that environment, operating under those conditions, bring that operating environment with them when they cross into Texas. 

The legal framework governing what these carriers are permitted to do on American roads is clear and has been since NAFTA. Cabotage refers to the transportation of property or passengers from point to point within a single country. Drivers may be admitted to deliver or pick up cargo traveling in the stream of international commerce, meaning the cargo is entering or leaving the United States. Movements not permitted include picking up a shipment at one US location and delivering that shipment to another US location. That prohibition is in the DHS guidelines published in 2012, in 49 CFR Section 365.501(b), and in 19 CFR Section 123.14(c). The law is not ambiguous. The enforcement is.

Using Mexican B-1 drivers to haul domestic loads is illegal and it is called cabotage, which is another reason the freight market has been under pressure. It’s happening a lot.

The economics driving cabotage violations are not subtle. A typical B-1 driver wage was about 27 cents per mile, roughly 35 cents adjusted for inflation in 2025. The American Transportation Research Institute estimated domestic carriers paid drivers 78 cents per mile on average in 2024. That is a 43-cent-per-mile labor arbitrage available to any carrier willing to violate federal cabotage law and dispatch a Mexican B-1 driver on domestic freight. A carrier running 10 trucks at 120,000 miles per year per unit captures approximately $5.1 million in labor cost savings annually relative to domestic wage rates. That is not a rounding error. That is a business model. 

Its a business model that puts domestic carriers at a structural competitive disadvantage in the spot market. When a shipper or broker sources capacity and finds a rate offer 15 to 20 percent below the domestic market rate, that gap often stems from this arithmetic. American carriers, American owner-operators, and American drivers are competing against a labor cost structure that federal law prohibits but federal enforcement has historically failed to police.

The Texas Department of Public Safety petitioned FMCSA in December 2024 to amend 49 CFR Section 383.23 to remove the reciprocal recognition of Mexican and Canadian CDLs for intrastate commerce outside a driver’s domicile, requiring foreign CDL holders to obtain a non-domiciled CDL with proper work authorization. Under the current reciprocal status, Mexican or Canadian CDL holders can operate in intrastate commerce in the United States for a US-based motor carrier without a non-domiciled CDL or work authorization. That loophole is how a carrier avoids the non-domiciled CDL process entirely. Hire a driver with a Mexican LFC under an employment model that technically classifies them as a domestic worker, and the work authorization question evaporates. 

The SAFER in Transport Act, with a companion bill introduced by Senator Todd Young in February 2026, calls for a memorandum of understanding between FMCSA and US Customs and Border Protection to improve enforcement of cabotage restrictions on foreign carriers. If that MOU gets executed, it would be the first formal coordination mechanism between the two agencies that currently operate in separate enforcement silos on this issue, one watching the border crossing and one watching the highway, with minimal information sharing between them on who went where after the initial crossing. 

The Canadian side of the cross-border picture is different in character if not entirely benign. Canadian carriers have 1.04 violations per inspection, versus 3.26 for Mexican carriers. Their out-of-service rate of 6.46 percent is above the US domestic baseline of 3.36 percent but well below the Mexican carrier OOS rate of 10.02 percent. Canadian carriers are revoked at 2.2 times the US baseline rate, the highest revocation rate in the cross-border dataset. The Ontario carrier population of 7,804 registered carriers is the single largest provincial concentration and warrants its own examination, given the volume of Canada-US freight moving through that corridor. The crash prediction picture puts 21.7 percent of Canadian carriers in Critical or High tier, which is 1.2 times the US baseline, not alarming in isolation, but above average.

The 77 percent of Canadian carriers and 78 percent of Mexican carriers that operate fleets of five trucks or fewer are also worth noting. Cross-border carrier risk is disproportionately a small-fleet problem. Smaller fleets amplify the impact of individual incidents on safety scores and crash prediction models. A single-truck operator with two crashes is statistically worse than a 100-truck fleet with ten crashes. That is partly why the Tamaulipas numbers look as extreme as they do and why they require interpretation alongside the absolute counts.

What the cross-border carrier intelligence data does not do is draw conclusions about individual carriers. A Tamaulipas-domiciled carrier scoring Critical on crash prediction is not automatically an unsafe operator. The data shows population-level patterns. For individual carrier analysis, the Carrier Lookup page is the right tool. What the population-level data does do is tell shippers, brokers, insurers, and enforcement personnel where to focus scrutiny and what baseline expectations are reasonable before a carrier is selected to touch American freight or American highways.

The trucks are out there. The regulations governing what they are permitted to do are documented. The enforcement gaps are documented. The financial consequences for domestic operators competing against illegal labor arbitrage are real and quantifiable. The data to examine it all is now on one page.

The post What 21,000 foreign trucks on American highways looks like appeared first on FreightWaves.

Maersk confirmed the Alliance Fairfax was one of two U.S.-flag ships to transit the strait on Monday. The other ship has not yet been identified.

The voyage comes at a fraught time in the Iran conflict as the U.S. and Iran exchanged threats of heightened violence amid a fragile ceasefire. The British-based Maritime Trade Operations security monitor since Sunday reported three suspected attacks on merchant vessels in the region.

The Alliance Fairfax ro-ro carrier is operated by Farrell Lines, a subsidiary of Maersk Line Limited, the U.S.-flag unit of A.P. Moeller-Maersk (OTC: AMKBY) of Denmark. It is one of approximately 60 ships that comprise the Maritime Administration’s Maritime Security Program, for U.S. government defense sealift requirements.

The ship has been enrolled in the MSP since 2012, and has made 170 port calls in that time.

Read more articles by Stuart Chirls here.

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The post Maersk ro-ro first U.S.-flag ship to safely clear Strait of Hormuz appeared first on FreightWaves.

The proxy battle at payments company and fuel card provider WEX is over, with the company bringing on board members backed by investor activist Impactive Capital.

CEO Melissa Smith will stay in her role, according to a statement released by WEX (NYSE: WEX). But she will no longer be board chair. Smith also will stay on the board and also continue to be president.

While Impactful pushed for the addition of outside directors and a change in the role of chair, it did not specifically call for Smith to be ousted as CEO in its proxy material.

WEX’ position to push back against the Impactive slate of three directors had been undermined in recent weeks by recent recommendations of proxy advisory services that shareholders vote for the three directors backed by Impactive. 

In a proxy filing submitted to the SEC as recently as Thursday, Impactive quoted some of those proxy advisory companies and their recommendations. For example, Egan-Jones said the three Impactive nominees “bring skills, experience, and ownership alignment that would meaningfully strengthen the Board’s ability to evaluate strategic alternatives, including the potential spin-off of the Benefits segment, and to hold management accountable for operational performance.”

And in its recommendation, Glass, Lewis & Co. specifically argued that the chairman and CEO roles should be split, referring to “sustained underperformance” at WEX under Smith’s tenure as chair.

The trio going on the WEX board

The three persons recommended by Impactive who will be going on the board are Kurt Adams, Ellen Alemany and Lauren Taylor Wolfe. 

The three WEX nominees that were opposed by Impactive besides Melissa Smith were Stephen Smith (no relation) and independent director Nancy Altobello. Stephen Smith along with Melissa Smith will be on the newly-constituted 11-person board. But Altobello, a current board member, will not.

Adams is the CEO of IPC Systems, which WEX described as a “provider of network services and trading communications technology for financial institutions.” Alemany is a director at First Citizens BancShares, and is a former chairwoman and CEO at CIT Group, a financial services company. Taylor Wolfe is the co-founder and managing partner of Impactive.

As part of the agreement, the company’s annual meeting of shareholders, slated to be held Tuesday, will be held May 14, giving voters more time to cast their ballots on the new slate of director nominees.

The key argument made by Impactive in its proxy battle to put three new directors on the board was WEX’ stock market performance against its peers.

In one of its numerous proxy filings with the Securities & Exchange Commission in recent weeks, also sent to shareholders, Impactive described WEX and Corpay (NYSE: CPAY) as a “duopoly” with 40% market share in commercial fleet card issuance. 

But according to the proxy material submitted by Impactive, WEX’ stock has fallen more than 20% in the last five years while Corpay’s has risen 38%.

Smith’s compensation relative to the company’s stock performance also had been raised as an issue by Impactive. 

Three directors at WEX last year received more than 30% votes against their retention on the board, including Mellissa Smith. Other WEX nominees received single-digit “no” votes. 

That surge of negative votes against the three nominees in 2025 came after Impactive sent a letter to shareholders saying it would oppose the trio. That may have set the stage for this year’s successful proxy battle by Impactive.  

WEX’ stock reacted positively to the news, rising $3.04, or 2.01%, to $154.18. Its 52-week high was reached on April 22 at $186.85.

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The post Card provider WEX reaches deal with activist investor; CEO Smith to stay appeared first on FreightWaves.

With the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration last week publishing a concurrent press release and notice in the Federal Register, the next phase of Motus is here.

The name derives from the Latin for motion, FMCSA said in its prepared statement. And the system is already in place to a limited degree. 

The next phase is significant enough for a wider swath of the trucking community that it warranted not only the Federal Register notice but also an email blast from the Scopelitis trucking-focused law firm, with the headline “Motus is Almost Here: Are You Ready for It ?”

FMCSA has not announced a firm date for the start of Motus phase II, but it is expected to be before the end of the second quarter. It will be a replacement for the Unified Registration System (URS) that began its rollout in 2015. 

“Motus will replace URS as well as the FMCSA Portal which is a web-based system that acts as a single entry point to FMCSA systems for various services and information that is used by motor carriers, their associates, and other authorized account holders to manage registration, to update company information, to access data on crash and inspection history, and to interact with other FMCSA systems,” FMCSA said in its Federal Register announcement. 

Among those other systems: the Drug and Alcohol Clearinghouse.

“Motus will serve as the unified registration system required by statute,” according to the Federal Register notice.

First phase already in use

The first steps toward introducing Motus go back to December, FMCSA said. It was opened then to what the agency called “supporting companies,” which the Department of Transportation defines as “authorized by FMCSA to file process agents on behalf of motor carriers, freight forwarders, and property brokers.” That got those companies in position to be able to offer assistance when phase II opened.

But FMCSA is not pitching Motus as simply a better way to store data on carriers. It is also boasting that it should improve the use of FMCSA data for fighting fraud and taking other security measures.

“Motus will streamline the registration process and put fraud-resistant security features, such as individual identity and business verification, at the forefront,” the agency said in its Federal Register notice.

What to look for

The Scopelitis email spelled out what will be happening in Motus when Phase II launches, possibly as early as May 15, the law firm said. Similar recommendations are in the Federal Register notice.

• Companies that are registered with FMCSA already should log into the current FMCSA portal, confirm that it is active and check that its PIN is working as well. If it isn’t, a new one should be requested. Scopelitis said the PIN might come only by regular mail, so it isn’t an instantaneous process.

• A company’s portal account has a “portal company official” listed. That same person will need to be the registrant into Motus, so the correct email and name needs to be checked.

• There are other pieces of information on a registering company that will need to be updated.

There are identity-proofing features in Motus, FMCSA said, using a system called IDEMIA that is in use in other parts of the federal government.

FMCSA has partnered with IDEMIA in the last year, and the agency said in the Federal Register that it will “perform identity document capture and verification services to verify the legitimacy of an applicant’s identity, to reduce fraudulent activity, to enhance the security of FMCSA systems, and to protect sensitive data in URS.”

Big benefit on fraud fighting predicted

P. Sean Garney, the co-director of Scopelitis Transportation Consulting, which is based in the Washington D.C. area, said he believed the use of IDEMIA in Motus will prove to be “significantly” beneficial in identifying fraudulent players through their data in the FMCSA system.

The use of that system will provide photographic and biometric evidence, Garney said. “Just the realness of the photo to verify that’s a real person, I think that’s huge,” Garney said. 

Business verification tools will help identify companies that have a “legitimate physical business address.”

“Most of the low lying fruit that they have found in the system so far has been those types of things where you have one address and 700 DOT numbers,” Garney added.

FMCSA’s Federal Register notice said all new applicants will be required to meet the system’s “identity proofing and verification requirements.” 

“This will enhance the Agency’s digital resilience, promote user confidence, and ensure that only

verified entities can register with FMCSA and access their registration information,” FMCSA said in its Federal Register notice. “Based on FMCSA’s latest information, Motus will verify the identity of all new applicants, as well as the approximately 800,000 existing registrants when users access the new system for the first time.” 

The Scopelitis email said FMCSA has been studying a change in policy where it would no longer assign Motor Carrier (MC) numbers and instead just use a DOT number as the “sole identifier for FMCSA registrants.”

But the law firm added it is “just a proposal and is not being implemented as part of the initial Motus rollout.”

It said FMCSA has indicated “the change is still under consideration.”

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The post Motus steps up: what carriers need to know about new FMCSA system appeared first on FreightWaves.

The announcement essentially declared that third-party logistics services is now a main business line, along with retail, cloud computing services and grocery.

Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) said it is extending its portfolio of freight, distribution, fulfillment and parcel shipping services to all businesses, effectively making available the excess capacity in its network to non-Amazon sellers. Companies across industries from automotive, to healthcare and retail will be able to ship anything from raw materials to finished goods.

Analysts said Amazon would need to invest in much more infrastructure to directly compete across the board with large ocean freight wholesalers, freight forwarders, trucking companies, and integrated logistics providers like FedEx and UPS.

“It’s a playbook Amazon has run for years. Build world-class capabilities to meet internal needs, productize and make it available commercially,” said Nate Skiver, founder of LPF Spend Management, on LinkedIn.

Amazon has been evolving for years into an integrated freight and logistics provider, externalizing portions of its logistics operation and offering wholesale capacity to shippers.

Fulfillment by Amazon has been around for nearly 20 years and now also allows small merchants selling on Amazon’s platform to use Amazon for inventory management and last-mile delivery. In early 2023, Amazon opened eligibility for Buy with Prime to all e-commerce merchants, instead of by invite only. The program allows online sellers, including those that do not sell on the company’s website, to offer Prime fulfillment services through their own online stores. Also in 2023, Amazon rolled out a stand-alone shipping service under which the retail-tech giant uses its independent drivers to provide pickups at warehouses and handle the shipments to final delivery.

In 2024, Amazon launched Amazon Air Cargo, allowing shippers to buy space on its private cargo airline. Meanwhile, Supply Chain by Amazon leverages the company’s position as a bulk buyer of ocean freight capacity. As an ocean consolidator for cargo from Asia to the United States, Amazon is responsible for picking up inventory from manufacturing facilities worldwide, booking the shipment with an ocean carrier, handling customs clearance and ground transportation, managing inventory replenishment, and delivering to its warehouse. And Amazon offers nationwide parcel delivery.

The final piece of the full logistics equation came in January when Amazon began offering less-than-truckload service through its Amazon Freight platform for inbound delivery to Amazon facilities, where the goods are stored and later shipped through the company’s regular package delivery. Many large shippers use already use Amazon to connect multiple parts of their supply chain, noted Derek Lossing, a former Amazon logistics executive and founder of Cirrus Global Advisors, in a blog post.

“The launch of ASCS represents an incremental step forward in a risk that has existed for years (Amazon’s encroachment on logistics), but we must be cautious to not overstate this risk. The transportation and logistics industry has always been competitive, and Amazon does not have the scale or physical network to displace all competitors. Companies with hard assets, quality offerings, and entrenched customer relationships will remain competitive, with the biggest risk to asset-light logistics providers,” said Citibank equity analyst Ariel Rosa in a client note.

Amazon on Monday said the debut of Amazon Supply Chain Services builds on the momentum from transporting, storing and delivering hundreds of millions of packages for outside shippers over the past three years.

“Amazon is bringing the infrastructure, intelligence, and scale of its supply chain services — proven over decades — to businesses everywhere, much like Amazon Web Services did for cloud computing,” said Peter Larsen, vice president of Amazon Supply Chain Services. “Supply chain wasn’t just a function at Amazon — it was core to providing an exceptional shopping experience. Our differentiator. The reason we could offer fast, dependable delivery that nobody else could. And with the launch of ASCS, we’re confident we can give any other business access to the same cost efficiency, reliability, and speed that we’ve built for Amazon customers.”  

Early users of Amazon’s end-to-end-logistics operation include Procter & Gamble, 3M, Land’s End and American Eagle Outfitters.

“Amazon is one of our key e-commerce partners, and we’re excited to leverage Amazon Supply Chain Services to position inventory closer to customers so we can reach them even faster,” said Andrew McLean, CEO of Lands’ End, in the news release. “This consistency is central to our solutions-based approach, enabling us to serve customers with confidence and agility, especially during peak seasons.”  

Procter & Gamble is using Amazon’s freight services to transport raw materials to production facilities and move finished goods across its distribution network, Amazon said. 3M is leveraging Amazon’s freight services to move products from its manufacturing sites to distribution centers worldwide; Lands’ End is using a unified inventory pool within Amazon’s network to fulfill orders across multiple sales channels; and American Eagle Outfitters is using Amazon’s parcel shipping network to deliver online orders from its American Eagle and Aerie website directly to customers nationwide.   

Amazon’s freight network is supported by a fleet of more than 80,000 trailers, 24,000 intermodal containers and 100 freighter aircraft. Amazon said customers also benefit from Amazon’s AI forecasting models and vast supply chain data set, which help optimize inventory placement. 

Starting Monday, businesses can access a centralized console to search, select, and sign up for the various ASCS services, according to the news release. 

“Amazon has been offering logistics services for at least three years. This just draws new attention to those capabilities, which have been tested and proven to work with case studies” of large shippers, said Satish Jindel, a prominent supply chain analyst and president of ShipMatrix, in an interview.

Freight brokers and forwarders should take Amazon’s announcement seriously if they support small retail customers, he warned. Those operators will have to demonstrate how they can provide better personalized shipping support than a tech behemoth, which will be targeting their customers.

Meanwhile, FedEx and UPS, which have pivoted to focus on B2B and premium B2C packages, “need to realize that Amazon is not just a B2C parcel guy because 18% of deliveries from Amazon online orders are delivered to businesses. A lot of small businesses are buying things online from Amazon now,” Jindel said.

The true significance of Amazon’s new marketing strategy isn’t the physical network, but supply chain management, Lossing argued.

“Its retail business depends on predicting demand, positioning inventory ahead of that demand, and executing delivery with precision. Over time, Amazon built not just a logistics network, but an interconnected system that links forecasting, inbound transportation, inventory placement, fulfillment, and final mile delivery into a single operating model. This is the holy grail of supply chain. That is where this announcement becomes meaningfully different. When control exists across the entire system, the conversation shifts.

“A traditional carrier competes on a Zone 6 rate. A freight forwarder competes on cost per kilo from Shenzhen to Los Angeles. Amazon reframes the question entirely by asking what happens if Zone 6 is no longer necessary. When inventory is positioned correctly, closer to demand and informed by real time data, the cost, speed, and complexity of downstream transportation change fundamentally. Optimization moves upstream into network design rather than downstream into parcel pricing. This is not an incremental improvement on existing logistics models. It is a different operating philosophy,” he wrote.

Wall Street is punishing freight transportation stocks in midday trading, with UPS down 9.5%, on concerns that Amazon news represents a major threat to their business, but several industry observers suggest the reaction is overblown because Amazon already competes in the logistics space.

(This story was updated on May 5 with commentary from Lossing).

Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.

Write to Eric Kulisch at ekulisch@freightwaves.com.

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A headline net loss of $8,000 included the benefit of a $12.7 million ($9.7 million after-tax) gain from the sale of a facility in Laredo, Texas. Non-operating income (the change in value of its stock portfolio) was $2.3 million higher year over year. Pamt booked a net loss of $8.1 million in the year-ago quarter.

The first quarter marked Pamt’s (NASDAQ: PAMT) sixth consecutive quarterly net loss. Approximately 35% of the company’s revenue is tied to the automobile industry, which is navigating a new trade landscape due to tariffs.

The TL unit reported an 8% y/y decline in average trucks in service and an 8% decline in revenue per truck per week. Loaded miles were flat with revenue per loaded mile down 8% to $2.06 (excluding fuel surcharges).

The segment reported a 103% adjusted operating ratio (excluding fuel). The OR was closer to 119%, excluding the impact of the real estate gain.

Salaries, wages and benefits expenses (as a percentage of revenue) increased 130 bps y/y even with a step down in trucks seated by company drivers. (All expense lines are reported on a consolidated basis.)

This quarter marked 10 straight operating losses for the TL unit.

Logistics revenue was up slightly y/y to $44 million. The OR improved 260 bps y/y to 95.4%. Pamt doesn’t provide gross profit margins for the unit, nor operating metrics like load counts and revenue per load.

The company used $2.7 million in operating cash flow in the first quarter. Liquidity (cash, equity holdings and availability on its line of credit) of $141 million was $3 million lower than at year-end 2025. Outstanding debt was reduced by $13 million to $321 million.

Pamt said “it intends to more actively implement share repurchases during the second quarter of 2026.”

Shares of PAMT are off 39% over the past year while shares of other publicly traded carriers are up roughly 30% to 55%. Pamt had 473,000 shares remaining for repurchase under an open authorization at the end of the first quarter.

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The post Losses continue at TL carrier Pamt Corp. appeared first on FreightWaves.

SONAR has launched a self-serve pricing tier that gives individual users direct access to its desktop rate intelligence tools — no sales call, no demo, and no contract required.

The new offering, called SONAR Quick Rates, is available starting at $24.99 per month and can be purchased immediately with a credit card at sonar.surf/signup. It is designed for individual users who want professional-grade rate data at a low price point, accessible directly from their desktop browser.

“Whether you use it as your primary rate source or as a second opinion on a lane, Quick Rates gives you the same TRAC Spot Rate data that freight professionals rely on — without the sales process,” the company said.

What’s Included

SONAR Quick Rates — available as the SONAR Rate Search plan — includes four core capabilities for desktop users:

• Unlimited Spot Rate Searches — TRAC Spot Rates by lane and equipment type (Van, Reefer, Flatbed), with confidence scores, low/high range, and 7-day and 28-day trend data.
• Capacity Conditions — Live market tightness indicators and outbound tender rejection rates, so users know whether capacity is tightening or loosening on a given lane.
• Spot Market Conditions Map — A geographic view of current freight market conditions across U.S. regions.
• Quick Rates Chrome Extension — A browser extension that surfaces lane rates directly in Chrome without leaving a TMS, email, or any other workflow.

A built-in margin calculator is also included, allowing users to input a target margin and total miles to instantly see RPM, flat rate, sell rate, and percent margin.

How SONAR Rate Access Works Across Products

Quick Rates is one of several ways freight professionals can access SONAR data, depending on their needs:

Quick Rates (Rate Search) — $24.99/mo or $249/yr — Desktop

Self-serve, low-price-point access for individual users. Use it as your go-to rate data source or as a second opinion on any lane. Sign up instantly at sonar.surf/signup. No demo, no contract.

SONAR Blue to Blue — $9.99/mo — iOS App

SONAR’s mobile rate app for on-the-go access. Blue to Blue delivers spot rate data on iPhone, designed for users who need rate intelligence away from their desk. Download from the Apple app store.

FreightWaves Freight Market Monitor — $199/mo

A broader market intelligence product powered by SONAR data, covering live indices across rates, volumes, LMI, and macro indicators. Includes AI market interpretations, shareable snapshots, and a personalized My Charts workspace — built for analysts and strategists tracking freight market trends. Access it via getfreightdata.com.

Full SONAR UI — Request a Demo at gosonar.com

For users who need the complete SONAR platform — including dashboards, freight context, SITREPs, multi-modal data, contract benchmarking, and more — the full UI is available by request. Visit gosonar.com to schedule a demo.

Availability

SONAR Quick Rates is available now on desktop. Monthly subscriptions are $24.99/month; annual subscriptions are $249/year, saving approximately 17%. Sign up at sonar.surf/signup.

About SONAR

SONAR is a freight market intelligence platform. It aggregates data from thousands of sources to provide real-time visibility into freight rates, capacity, volumes, and market conditions across every major mode of transportation. It provides more than just data, but also research and context to understand trends and potential disruptions to your supply chain.

The post SONAR Launches Self-Serve Quick Rates — Freight Intelligence Without the Sales Call appeared first on FreightWaves.

Operating costs hit $2.26 per mile in 2024 — the highest non-fuel cost ever recorded. And rates haven’t kept up.

Dispatch teams are making high-impact load decisions every day without clear insight into which freight actually protects margin — and which quietly erodes it. In today’s market, that gap is expensive.

“Busy But Not Profitable? A Fleet Owner’s Guide to Margin-first Operations” breaks down exactly where margin slips — and what top-performing mid-market fleets are doing differently.

Inside, you’ll learn:

• Why utilization is a motion metric, not a profitability metric — and what to measure instead
• How “busy but broke” happens and why mid-market fleets feel it first
• The 30-day margin review every fleet leader should run today
• What changes when dispatch starts making decisions with full cost visibility

Download the Guide

The post The Freight Is Moving. Find Out Where the Money Went. appeared first on FreightWaves.

This story was told most clearly by our freight patterns. For twenty years, goods flowed overwhelmingly from the coasts inward. Millions of containers arrived at our ports filled with products made by foreign labor, then trucked toward the center of the country to feed a consumption-heavy lifestyle. The Heartland was a destination for finished goods, rarely the source.

This year, that logic flipped.

SONAR, our high-frequency data platform that captures supply chain movements, shows how the economy is changing right before our eyes. By monitoring real-time order flows to trucking firms and rail carriers, we can see economic shifts months before they appear in government reports. What we are seeing today is a reversal of the historical norm: coastal activity remains quiet, while the middle of the country is experiencing a breakout in freight activity.

The catalyst is the voracious build-out of artificial intelligence infrastructure. Contrary to the popular imagination, AI is not purely a digital phenomenon; in the physical world, it is the bedrock of a new heavy industry.

This industrial tail extends far beyond software providers to the energy, power, and construction services required to build massive “data factories.” The scale is staggering. During the construction of the Interstate Highway System, the United States spent approximately $20 billion per year (adjusted for inflation) over 35 years. Today, AI data center investment is hitting $20 billion every two weeks. And unlike the highway system, this infrastructure is being built with private capital.

These “Gigasites” represent a new economy dependent on three pillars: data centers, energy supply, and the AI models that optimize them both. This is where the digital becomes physical. According to SONAR analysts, a standard 500-megawatt data center requires roughly 30,000 truckloads of concrete, structural steel, and copper.

Beyond raw materials, these facilities house an array of heavy industrial equipment: massive turbines, redundant generators, and high-voltage transmission infrastructure. As projects scale into the gigawatt range, demand grows exponentially. While 500-megawatt centers were recently the gold standard, they are no longer the ceiling. Meta’s “Prometheus” project in Ohio is designed as a one-gigawatt campus, consuming as much electricity as the entire city of San Francisco. Even larger projects are coming online, such as the Delta Gigasite in Utah, which aims for 10 gigawatts over the next decade, a footprint that will eventually require more power than the entire state of Utah consumes today.

America does not currently have the capacity to power these mega-projects, but the market is responding. Utilities are expanding existing plants, and a new generation of power stations is being planned, often funded directly by the “hyperscalers” themselves.

The materials for this build-out are coming from the “Rust Belt” and the South, regions once hollowed out by globalization. This reindustrialization is not accidental. Federal tax incentives, specifically domestic content requirements, have encouraged companies to source equipment from American manufacturers. But if policy is the carrot, our unique energy position is the engine.

By steering procurement toward domestic sources, federal policy has tapped into a decisive competitive advantage: our staggering abundance of natural gas. While much of the world faces shortages, the American interior is practically swimming in fuel. Because natural gas is often a byproduct of oil production, the shale revolution has created a massive surplus. Today, oil companies often flare this gas or pay to have it removed; now, new pipelines are being planned to transport it directly to the heavy industry hubs of the Heartland.

This energy surplus fuels the very factories producing the steel and cement required for the AI era. These are energy-intensive processes: cement production alone requires temperatures exceeding 1,400°C. Having a cheap, local fuel source is a structural advantage no other nation possesses.

The evidence of this mobilization is appearing in the dirt. While consumer-related freight remains flat, SONAR data shows freight volumes are up roughly 11% this year. This surge is concentrated in industrial modes—flatbeds and railroads—moving raw materials from the Midwest and South outward.

In modern, automated manufacturing, energy is the decisive factor. In sectors like steel and plastics, energy can represent up to 38% of total production costs. In this new era, the price of a megawatt is more important than the price of a labor hour. We aren’t just reshoring because of policy; we are reshoring because the U.S. Heartland is the most efficient place on Earth to produce.

Other data points confirm the shift. The ISM Manufacturing PMI reached 52.7% in March, signaling expansion. Meanwhile, capital goods now account for a record 41% of all U.S. imports. Businesses are no longer just importing sneakers; they are importing the high-value tools required to build this new infrastructure here.

For years, the goods economy relied on foreign products arriving at coastal hubs. But as the center of the country begins to export freight again, the gravity is shifting. America is winning this race because we are the only nation that can pair world-leading software with the energy abundance and industrial landmass required to scale it.

The “hollowing out” of American manufacturing was real. But the data now tells a different story. Driven by technology and energy abundance, the economic winds are finally blowing inland. The Heartland is producing again, and for the first time in a generation, the center is holding.

The post The heartland’s revenge: how AI is reindustrializing the American interior appeared first on FreightWaves.

The launch follows a recent $95 million Series C funding round led by Valor Equity Partners and the Valor Atreides AI Fund, with participation from 8VC, Founders Fund, Index Ventures, J.P. Morgan Growth Equity Partners, and Tao Capital Partners.

“Automation and AI are only as powerful as the data foundation they operate on,” said Matt McKinney, CEO and co-founder of Loop. “With this launch, Loop fundamentally shifts from a platform that helps humans work faster to an autonomous system that executes complex logistics strategies on their behalf. We are delivering the pristine data foundation required to bring agentic AI to the supply chain.”

The Bad Data Problem That Plagues Supply Chains

For decades, logistics teams have grappled with fragmented, unstructured data trapped in emails, physical documents and disconnected systems. This caused a cascade of silo-related issues. Transportation struggles to optimize costs. Finance lacks visibility into true landed costs. Customer care operates reactively. Transformation teams watch AI pilots fail because the underlying data simply isn’t there.

McKinney traces the problem back to his days at Uber Freight.

“When we were on the freight product at Uber Freight, we found an industry-wide problem: invoice reconciliation,” McKinney said. “As we got into that and realized what was causing all the issues and exceptions, we discovered it was bad data.”

The breakthrough came faster than anyone expected. Large language models (LLMs) that McKinney anticipated reaching maturity in 2030 delivered in 2025, making Loop’s mission possible: unlocking value trapped in operations to power the physical economy.

DUX 2.0: The Data Engine Powering Agent-Ready Intelligence

At the platform’s core sits DUX 2.0, Loop’s next-generation domain-specific language model designed to extract and normalize data from PDFs, emails, spreadsheets and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. The engine collects over 200 data points per shipment and expands into customs, tariff document review and purchase order matching.

The key part is tailoring the solution to speak the specific language of the supply chain, something that a general LLM may find difficult to understand the nuances. The other issue is that it’s costly to make mistakes.

“You can’t take an off-the-shelf general horizontal LLM and apply it to supply chain,” McKinney said. “Supply chain runs on its own language, and those things hallucinate. And guess what? If you lose trust with your vendor or your customer, you’re done.”

The Exception Agent: From Weeks to Minutes

Loop’s Exception Agent operates as an autonomous “AI teammate” that manages touchless exception handling — initiating disputes with carriers, resolving payment queries and ensuring accurate invoice payments.

McKinney described how “swarm agents” work together, with process validation agents checking each other’s work to maintain accuracy.

“The exception is the rule in supply chain,” McKinney said. “If you don’t have an exception agent that can autonomously resolve these exceptions and initiate disputes, you’re not gonna be able to unlock your team’s time.”

The results speak for themselves. One large retailer had 200 customer packages inadvertently delivered to pickup locations instead of residences.

“An agent detected this — literally the exception agent took this in hours and immediately notified the carrier that there was an issue and they should go pick up these packages,” McKinney said. “So the next day, the carrier was able to pick up those packages and get them to the customers’ homes on time.”

Previously, resolution would have required customer complaints filtering through care teams, manual investigation and weeks of back-and-forth.

Loop Intelligence and the Strategic Layer

The platform’s Loop Intelligence feature transforms company data into strategic power through an AI Assistant that accepts natural-language prompts for network optimization and financial clarity.

McKinney positioned the platform as a layer that orchestrates across existing execution systems.

“Think of those as execution systems that are really databases, and they are a tool that humans use,” McKinney said. “Agents actually do all the work. So those are the system of records. Agents are the system of action.”

Looking Ahead

The $95 million investment arrives as supply chains face volatile operating conditions — rising energy costs, tariffs and nearshoring pressures reversing 50 years of globalization trends.

“Supply chain is one of the largest contributors to GDP, and it’s one of the industries that hasn’t really been touched by technology in the same way because there just wasn’t the same level of investment other industries had,” McKinney said.

Loop plans to use the capital to hire AI engineers, expand into trade compliance, warehouse, procurement, and inbound logistics data, and scale customer impact across enterprises including Outset Medical, Clemens Food Group, Olipop, Kendra Scott, and Dot Foods.

“Loop went deep into one of the hardest parts of the supply chain and turned it into an advantage for their customers,” said Antonio Gracias, founder, CEO and chief investment officer of Valor. “That foundation extends into other operational and financial functions, which is why Loop is positioned to become the intelligence layer of the entire supply chain.”

The post Loop launches new platform as intelligence layer for entire supply chain appeared first on FreightWaves.

The Warren, Michigan-based logistics provider reported Q1 2026 revenue of $367.6 million, down from $382.4 million a year earlier, alongside a net loss of $3.5 million, or $(0.13) per share, compared to net income of $6 million, or $0.23 per share, in Q1 2025.

Universal’s (NASDAQ: ULH) operating income also fell sharply to $4.8 million, with operating margin compressing to 1.3%, down from 4.1% last year.

CEO Tim Phillips pointed to ongoing softness in intermodal markets as the primary driver behind the weak quarter.

“Our first-quarter performance reflects a slow start to the year driven primarily by continued weakness in our intermodal segment, including lower volumes and pricing pressure,” Phillips said in a news release.

Universal’s intermodal segment saw the steepest decline, with revenue falling 32.3% year over year to $47.9 million as both volumes and pricing deteriorated.

Load volumes dropped 23.3%, while revenue per load declined more than 10%, pushing the segment to an operating loss of $13.1 million and a negative margin of 27.4%.

The company said the recovery in intermodal is taking longer than expected, though it is implementing operational changes aimed at restoring profitability.

In contrast, Universal’s contract logistics segment continued to provide a buffer against broader market softness.

Revenue in the segment rose 5.3% year over year to $269.5 million, driven by dedicated transportation and value-added services.

However, profitability declined, with operating income falling to $17.5 million and margins narrowing to 6.5%, suggesting rising costs and lower efficiency across programs.

The trucking segment also posted declines, with revenue down 9.7% to $50.2 million amid lower volumes and pricing pressure.

Brokerage activity, embedded within trucking, generated $16.7 million in revenue, down from $20.3 million a year earlier.

Operating income in trucking fell to just $0.6 million, reflecting tighter margins across the segment.

Universal’s EBITDA declined to $40.7 million, down from $51.7 million last year, with EBITDA margin falling to 11.1%.

The company ended the quarter with $17.9 million in cash and $754.7 million in debt, while capital expenditures totaled $9.6 million.

Despite the weaker quarter, the company declared a quarterly dividend of 10.5 cents per share, signaling confidence in its longer-term outlook.

Q1 2026 Financial Snapshot (Universal Logistics)

The post Universal Logistics slips to Q1 loss as intermodal collapse deepens appeared first on FreightWaves.

The only exception: If the combined railroad is required to spin off one of its duplicative main lines between Kansas City and St. Louis. If the merger is approved, UP would have a pair of K.C.-St. Louis routes, including its former Missouri Pacific via Jefferson City, Mo., and NS’ former Wabash via Moberly, Mo.

The information from the railroads’ merger agreement was disclosed on Thursday in the revised merger application they filed with the Surface Transportation Board. The consolidation if approved would create a transcontinental rail colossus with more than 52,000 miles of track in 43 states.

UP (NYSE: UNP) would be willing to accept overhead trackage rights allowing a rival Class I railroad to serve shippers and short lines that would see their post-merger rail options drop from two carriers to one or three carriers to two.

The merger application identifies five 2-to-1 customer locations and four 3-to-2 customer sites, all in Illinois. Not all of the locations currently use rail service, however, and UP has offered affected customers the ability to receive service from another Class I railroad.

Otherwise UP will not grant other railroads wide access to its or NS’ (NYSE: NSC)  routes via line sales, trackage rights, or haulage rights. And aside from K.C.-St. Louis, any line sale required as part of regulatory approval of the deal is an automatic condition that would allow UP to scuttle the merger.

UP also won’t accept a general proportional rate obligation. It has agreed only to proportional revenue rate agreements, now dubbed its Committed Gateway Pricing program, for manifest carload traffic interchanged through Chicago, St. Louis, Memphis, or New Orleans.

Under the merger agreement there is no freestanding right for UP to terminate the deal the moment the STB announces an unacceptable condition. UP has no obligation to close if such a condition is imposed, but it cannot immediately walk away, either.

UP could accept a minor reciprocal switching obligation or a small divestiture and still stay in the deal, as long as the total impact of board-imposed conditions stays under a $750 million threshold. Anything over that amount triggers a review.

If burdensome conditions prompt UP to walk away, it will have to pay NS a $2.5 billion breakup fee.

Either railroad can terminate the deal if it isn’t closed by Jan. 28, 2028 or if the Surface Transportation Board or a court issues a final decision blocking the merger. The end date automatically extends, however, if the STB adds time to its review clock.

Subscribe to FreightWaves’ Rail e-newsletter and get the latest insights on rail freight right in your inbox.

Related coverage:

STB chairman, industry leaders to headline Future of Rail Symposium

Union Pacific, Norfolk Southern file revised merger application

Anti-merger group launches as UP, NS prepare to refile applicatio

Canadian National’s first-quarter profit slips

The post Union Pacific would exit Norfolk Southern merger if STB orders widespread line sales or trackage rights appeared first on FreightWaves.

The new service from DHL’s freight management arm will operate Hanoi (Vietnam)-Taipei (Taiwan)-Anchorage (Alaska)-Chicago/Cincinnati-Seoul (South Korea)-Hanoi with Boeing 777 freighters flown by partner carrier Kalitta Air, a DHL spokesperson said in an email exchange. U.S. destinations will alternate between Chicago and Cincinnati.

DHL Express (XETRA: DHL) operates a global air network using multiple airlines, including its own fleet and third-party carriers, to move overnight packages for customers. Remaining capacity is sold to logistics companies with heavy B2B shipments. DHL Global Forwarding is the largest buyer of the excess capacity. DHL Aviation is a unit within Express that manages airline operations.

Providing self-controlled charter aircraft allows logistics companies to offer shippers more reliable capacity and service than tendering shipments through regular scheduled flights from passenger and all-cargo carriers.

DHL Global Forwarding’s decision to add exclusive capacity on the Asia-U.S. trade lane follows the recent expansion of charter flights between Asia and Europe.

On March 29, DHL Global Forwarding introduced weekly flights connecting Liège, Belgium, and Hong Kong to meet growing transport demand for general cargo. A service between Shanghai, China, and DHL’s hub in Leipzig, Germany, is scheduled to commence on June1, said the spokesperson.

DHL intends the services to be long-term operations that continue into the peak winter season, with market conditions determining any further extension, the spokesperson explained. 

Global Forwarding has secured one Boeing 777-300 converted freighter aircraft and a brand new factory-built 777 for the new Asia-Europe routes. The converted freighter is a former Emirates passenger jet that was reconfigured to freighter mode by Israel Aircraft Industries and delivered earlier this year to DHL, which placed it with Kalitta Air to operate on its behalf. 

DHL signed contracts with Boeing between 2018 and 2022 to purchase 28 777 aircraft for the upgrade of its intercontinental fleet, with the final units delivered this year.

“Expanding our controlled capacity on the Asia-Europe corridor reinforces our commitment to reliability, speed, and resilience for our customers,” said Henk Venema, global head of air freight DHL Global Forwarding, in a news release announcing the two new routes five weeks ago. “The demand on that trade lane continues to grow at an exceptional pace, and strengthening our network ensures that we stay ahead of customer needs.” 

The Liège-Hong Kong connection has a stopover in Tel Aviv, Israel, to support importers and exporters in the country. The return leg from Hong Kong to Liège feeds shipments directly into DHL’s European distribution network. The spokesperson said DHL has full flights on flights to Tel Aviv, with volumes from the European Union and Asia. 

Global Forwarding also charters full flights operated by other airlines shuttling between Shanghai and the EU. 

Earlier this year, Global Forwarding announced it was prioritizing use of DHL aircraft for pharmaceutical shipments on specially designated corridors. One of the new routes connects Brussels, Belgium, and Cincinnati, DHL’s primary North American air hub. The multi-weekly service is operated by Kalitta Air with a 777-300 passenger-to-freighter aircraft. The dedicated pharma network is expected to eventually include Germany, India, Singapore and Japan.

Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.

Write to Eric Kulisch at ekulisch@freightwaves.com.

RELATED STORIES:

DHL Group boosts profits despite lower shipment volumes, revenue

DHL prioritizes own cargo jets for pharmaceuticals transport 

The post DHL Forwarding to expand Asia-US air cargo capacity in June appeared first on FreightWaves.

While many shippers hesitate to outsource their transportation management due to fears of losing visibility, e2open’s Logistics as a Service (LaaS) is proving that companies don’t have to choose between execution capacity and strategic control.

A unique approach to LaaS

Unlike traditional managed transportation services that force shippers to hand over the keys to logistics operations entirely, e2open’s LaaS model is designed around flexibility.

The service allows shippers to outsource their day-to-day execution while retaining full ownership of their carrier strategy and pricing agreements. This collaborative approach expands access to capacity without compromising existing partnerships – all within the e2open transportation management system (TMS) ecosystem.

“So you can do it yourself, or we can take on that work for you, and you can pay us to do that work for you,” said Matthew Anderson, vice president of e2open’s specialty products, in an interview with FreightWaves. “There’s no competing priorities. So we’re not trying to hit certain brokerage numbers. We’re not trying to make money on a per load basis. … It is strictly geared around saying you’re capable of using the technology yourself using the TMS, but we can do it for you.”

By offering flexible engagement models that range from hybrid support to a full outsource, e2open helps companies reduce empty miles, manage inbound and outbound shipments.

The service currently manages over three billion dollars in freight and cuts clients’ transportation spend by up to 10%.

The team behind the technology

While e2open provides industry-leading Transportation Management System (TMS) software, the true engine of its LaaS offering is its people. The service employs over 300 logistics coordinators, analysts and supply chain engineers across locations worldwide in Holland, Michigan and Peru.

Molly Feller, vice president of e2open’s LaaS branch, explained how the team manages to scale such a massive operation while maintaining high service levels.

“One of the things that we’ve spent a lot of time on is working to create processes that can be easily repeatable – and so we have a lot of [standard operating procedures],” she said in an interview with FreightWaves. “We want people to come here and have a career here as well. We have a really great onboarding process [and] career advancement process.”

This strong foundation of standard operating procedures recently allowed the company’s LaaS team to expand rapidly into South America, growing its Peru team from zero to 80 employees in just a year and a half.

Real-world results: Aspire Bakeries

The value of this dedicated human expertise paired with advanced software is evident in e2open’s case study on its LaaS partnership with Aspire Bakeries.

The cross-category foodservice company – home to popular brands like Otis Spunkmeyer and La Brea Bakery – was initially a software-only user of e2open’s TMS. However, as Aspire Bakeries experienced a significant increase in business volume alongside severe winter weather disrupting the transport industry, the company realized it was only using the TMS to tender freight and wasn’t fully leveraging the data.

To capitalize on the system’s more complex capabilities, Aspire Bakeries transitioned to the LaaS model. Today, a dedicated e2open LaaS team – consisting of load planners, a systems admin, a carrier management specialist and a manager – runs the transportation technology on the bakery’s behalf. 

This dedicated group makes real-time decisions to mitigate costs and service risks, turning complex TMS data into actionable intelligence.

Through combining cutting-edge technology with a deep bench of supply chain experts, e2open helps ensure that companies like Aspire Bakeries can weather industry disruptions and focus on their core business, leaving the heavy lifting of logistics to the experts.

The post e2open Logistics as a Service gives shippers control while driving capacity appeared first on FreightWaves.

Pre-tax income rose 13.5%, to $1.82 billion, as revenue increased 5%, to $5.92 billion, BNSF’s corporate parent, Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE: BRK-B), reported on Saturday morning. The railroad’s operating ratio improved 2.3 points to 65.6% as improved fuel efficiency and labor productivity more than offset higher fuel prices and wages.

Overall volume increased 2.2% thanks largely to growth in grain shipments.

Consumer products volume including intermodal and automotive  increased 1.4% compared to a year ago, primarily due to growth in international intermodal traffic, Berkshire said.

Agricultural and energy volume increased 11.6% due to higher demand for grain, petroleum fuels, and oilseeds and meals.

Industrial products volume declined 0.6%, which Berkshire said was “due to lower shipments of plastics and building products, due to continued softness in the housing market.”

Coal volume declined 2.3%. “The volume decrease was primarily attributable to utility coal plant retirements, partially offset by increased demand from the impact of higher natural gas prices,” Berkshire said.

Subscribe to FreightWaves’ Rail e-newsletter and get the latest insights on rail freight right in your inbox.

Related coverage:

STB chairman, industry leaders to headline Future of Rail Symposium

Union Pacific, Norfolk Southern file revised merger application

Anti-merger group launches as UP, NS prepare to refile applicatio

Canadian National’s first-quarter profit slips

The post Grain, efficiency propel BNSF first-quarter earnings appeared first on FreightWaves.

It also makes this one of the more important moments to understand exactly how commercial truck financing works, what the advertised numbers actually mean, and where the terms that cost you the most tend to hide.

LendingTree published a commercial truck financing guide in early 2026 listing five lenders with starting rates from 7.9% to 8.5%, terms up to 84 months, and minimum credit scores ranging from 550 to 650. The information is broadly accurate as far as it goes. But a guide built for a general small business audience leaves out the trucking-specific context that changes what those numbers actually mean for a carrier — and the verification work that should happen before any of those options becomes a signed agreement.

Here is the complete picture.

What the Advertised Rates Actually Mean

The rate range for commercial truck financing in 2026 runs from roughly 6% to 35% APR depending on credit profile, lender type, time in business, and the condition and age of the truck being financed. The 7.9% starting rates cited by specialty lenders like Truck Lenders USA are real — for borrowers who qualify at the top of their credit requirements. A carrier with a 650 credit score, two years of clean business history, and a truck in solid condition can access rates in that range.

What moves the rate up from there is a specific and predictable list of factors. Credit score below 680 adds roughly 2 to 5 percentage points to starting rates at most specialty lenders. Time in business under two years — which applies to a significant portion of small carriers — either disqualifies you from lenders with that requirement or pushes you toward higher-rate products. Used truck age over seven years or mileage over 500,000 creates additional risk premium that lenders price into the rate or use as a disqualifier entirely.

As of early 2026, personal-credit semi-truck loans typically fall between 6% and 12% APR, while business-credit fleet loans commonly land between 5% and 9% APR — but those ranges assume a borrower who meets conventional lending criteria. The carrier who is three years into their authority with a 620 credit score buying a 2017 Peterbilt with 650,000 miles is looking at a different product at a materially different rate, possibly from a specialty lender charging 15% to 25% whose headline page shows 8.5%.

The verification point: always ask for the APR, not the interest rate. Several lenders in the commercial truck space advertise an interest rate rather than an APR. The difference is that APR includes origination fees, documentation fees, and other charges that are folded into the actual cost of borrowing. A loan with an 8% interest rate and a $2,500 origination fee on a $100,000 truck loan has an APR meaningfully above 8%. Comparing interest rates across lenders without converting to APR is comparing different measurements. Always ask for the APR and get it in writing before signing anything.

The Five Lender Categories and What Each One Is Actually For

The LendingTree guide covers five specific lenders. The broader market has five categories of lenders worth understanding, and each one serves a different need at a different cost.

Traditional banks offer the lowest rates — typically 4% to 8% APR for new or used semi-trucks as of January 2026 — but carry the highest qualification thresholds. A credit score above 700, two or more years of business history, documented annual revenue, and a truck that is new or in excellent condition are the baseline requirements. If your profile clears those bars, bank financing is the cheapest money available. If it does not, a bank is not where to spend your time.

Specialty truck lenders — Truck Lenders USA, CAG Truck Capital, Commercial Fleet Financing, and similar — exist specifically for the trucking market and carry industry knowledge that general business lenders do not. They understand operator-level risk differently than a bank credit committee does. Rates from specialty lenders typically run 7% to 12% for qualified borrowers, and their willingness to work with lower credit scores, specific truck makes and conditions, and non-standard situations is the value they provide relative to banks. CAG Truck Capital’s diesel technicians on staff reviewing vehicle history before underwriting is a genuine differentiator — a lender who understands the mechanical risk of the collateral is a meaningfully different counterparty than one who relies entirely on a credit score.

Online lenders and equipment finance companies like Taycor Financial offer the broadest credit access — minimum scores as low as 550, no time-in-business requirement, amounts up to $5 million — at higher rates. The 8% starting rate listed for Taycor is their best-case scenario. The actual rate for a carrier with a 560 credit score and no established business history will be higher, and the documentation fee mentioned in their terms is a real cost that needs to be factored into the APR calculation.

SBA lending — specifically the 7(a) and 504 programs — offers the lowest rates for qualifying borrowers with the longest terms and the most extensive documentation requirements. An SBA 504 loan, which is specifically designed for asset purchases like equipment, provides fixed rates well below conventional lending — currently in the range of 6% to 8% — with terms up to 10 years. The SBA guarantees a portion of the loan, which allows lenders to approve borrowers they would not otherwise touch. The trade-off is time: SBA loan approval runs four to eight weeks, which makes it unsuitable for time-sensitive purchases on the dealer lot but genuinely useful for planned equipment acquisition.

Dealer financing is the fifth category and the one that benefits from the most caution. When a dealer offers in-house financing or a financing partner, the convenience is real and the rate may or may not be competitive. Dealers earn a yield spread on financing — a portion of the rate margin goes to the dealer when they place you with a lending partner. That incentive is not necessarily against your interests, but it is a reason to have done your rate homework before sitting at the dealer’s desk. A carrier who walks in knowing their qualification profile and the current market rate range is in a fundamentally different negotiating position than one who starts the financing conversation at the dealership.

The Terms That Cost More Than the Rate

The interest rate is the most visible number in a commercial truck loan. It is not always the most expensive one.

Down payment requirements are where small carriers get stretched most painfully. The LendingTree guide correctly notes that down payments range from 0% to 35% depending on the lender and borrower profile. Most lenders require 10% to 20% for borrowers with good credit, but that range shifts upward for lower credit scores, older trucks, high mileage, and shorter business history. A carrier buying a $100,000 used truck with a 620 credit score and 18 months in business may face a 25% to 30% down payment requirement — $25,000 to $30,000 upfront before they write the first monthly payment. That is working capital that comes directly out of the cash reserve that the same carrier needs for fuel, insurance, maintenance, and the first 90 days of debt service while the new truck ramps up revenue. The down payment is not just a qualification hurdle. It is a cash flow event that needs to be planned for explicitly, not absorbed from operating funds.

Personal guarantees are the term that many small carriers sign without fully understanding the implication. A personal guarantee makes the business owner personally liable for the debt if the business defaults — meaning the lender can pursue personal assets, including personal bank accounts, home equity, and other personal property, to recover the balance. Most commercial truck loans from specialty and online lenders require a personal guarantee, and the SBA requires one for most loans. Understanding that you are signing a personal guarantee before you sign it — not discovering it in the fine print afterward — is the difference between an informed financial decision and an exposure you did not intend to take on.

Loan term length is the most commonly misunderstood trade-off in equipment financing. An 84-month term on a $150,000 truck loan lowers the monthly payment significantly compared to a 60-month term, which makes the near-term cash flow look better. It also means paying interest for an additional two years on a depreciating asset whose maintenance costs are rising as it ages. The total interest paid on an 84-month term at 8% is materially higher than on a 60-month term at the same rate. The right term depends on the monthly cash flow reality of the specific operation — but the decision should be made with the total interest cost calculated, not just the monthly payment.

Prepayment penalties are present in some commercial truck loan agreements and absent in others. A carrier who finances a truck for 72 months and wants to refinance or pay it off early in month 30 — because rates improved, because the business grew, because the freight market recovered — can face a prepayment penalty that makes early payoff expensive. Ask about prepayment terms before signing, especially on longer-term loans. Several specialty lenders specifically advertise no prepayment penalties; that is a genuine differentiator worth asking about.

The Used Truck Variable That Lenders Price Differently

The compliance exit equipment flooding dealer lots right now creates a specific financing dynamic worth understanding. Most lenders have explicit criteria for the trucks they will finance based on age and mileage — and those criteria vary enough across lenders that the truck you are trying to finance may qualify with one lender and not with another.

In general, purchasing a truck that is more than 10 years old with more than 700,000 miles will be difficult to finance because the truck serves as collateral and older trucks carry higher breakdown risk in a lender’s risk model. But that threshold is not universal. Some specialty lenders will finance trucks up to 15 years old in documented good condition. Others cap out at seven years regardless of condition. The pre-purchase diagnostic article published on this platform is directly relevant here: a clean JPRO and Cummins INSITE report that documents low fault codes, maintained aftertreatment, and a reasonable idle history is not just due diligence on the mechanical side. It is documentation that supports a financing conversation by demonstrating the truck’s condition in terms a lender’s underwriting model can use.

A carrier who walks into a financing conversation with a pre-purchase diagnostic showing a low-risk truck profile is presenting different collateral than one who presents the same truck with no diagnostic documentation. That difference can be the margin between approval and denial, or between a rate at the low end of a lender’s range and one at the top.

What to Have Ready Before You Apply

The carriers who move through commercial truck financing approvals fastest — and with the best terms — are the ones who have organized their documentation before the first conversation with a lender rather than scrambling for it after the fact.

The standard documentation package for a commercial truck loan includes three to six months of business bank statements, the most recent two years of business and personal tax returns, a bill of sale or purchase agreement for the truck, proof of active DOT and MC authority, a copy of the commercial driver’s license, and proof of insurance or an insurance commitment letter. If you are working toward an SBA loan, add a business plan or financial projection and a schedule of existing debts.

The business bank statements are the most important document in the package for a lender evaluating cash flow. Clean, consistent cash flow through a dedicated business account — revenue in, operating expenses out, a visible pattern — tells a story that a lender’s underwriter can underwrite against. Mixed personal and business banking, inconsistent deposits, and unexplained large withdrawals tell a different story. If your business banking is not currently clean and separate from personal accounts, address that before you start the financing process.

The Verification Checklist

Before signing any commercial truck financing agreement, run through this list:

Get the APR in writing, including all fees. Compare it against at least two other lenders. Know your credit score before any lender pulls it — multiple hard inquiries in a short window affect your score, though most scoring models treat multiple inquiries for the same loan type within a 45-day window as a single inquiry. Confirm the prepayment penalty terms. Understand whether the personal guarantee is limited or unlimited — some personal guarantees are capped at a specific dollar amount, others are open-ended. Verify the truck age and mileage requirements for the specific lender before you identify the specific truck, not after. And understand the total interest paid over the full term, not just the monthly payment — run the amortization calculation or ask the lender to produce it.

The financing market for commercial trucks in 2026 is legitimately more accessible than it has been. The rate environment, the available lender options, and the volume of equipment on the market create real opportunity for small carriers positioned to act on it. The operators who capture that opportunity profitably are the ones who understand what they are signing before they sign it.

The post The Commercial Truck Financing Market Has More Options Than Most Small Carriers Realize — and More Traps Than Most Lenders Will Tell You About appeared first on FreightWaves.

It is free. It is online. It is two days. Registration is required but takes two minutes at the SBA’s website. The sessions run from 11 AM to roughly 5:45 PM Eastern both days, which means a driver coming off a night run can catch the afternoon sessions. A dispatcher or fleet owner managing an office can drop into sessions between calls. This is not a $2,000 conference in Las Vegas. It is the federal government and a roster of major business partners putting substantive content in front of small business owners at no cost — and several sessions are directly relevant to the problems this platform covers every week.

Here is what is on the schedule and why specific sessions matter for trucking operations.

Tuesday, May 5

11:15 AM — Reclaim Your Time: Make AI Work for You (Google)

The AI conversation in trucking has been dominated by large carrier applications — autonomous vehicles, predictive routing systems that require enterprise software budgets. What this session is likely to cover is the practical layer underneath that: the AI tools available right now that a five-truck fleet owner or solo operator can actually use to reduce administrative burden. That means things like AI-assisted invoice drafting, automated follow-up on unpaid receivables, load description optimization for direct shipper outreach, and the kind of dispatch and scheduling assistance that previously required either a dedicated person or a subscription to a platform you could not afford.

The operators who are going to win the next phase of this freight market are not just the ones with the right equipment on the right lanes. They are the ones who free up enough of their own time to make better business decisions. If AI tools can reduce the time you spend on paperwork, invoice chasing, and administrative scheduling by even two hours per week, that is 100 hours per year redirected toward the revenue-generating and relationship-building activities that actually grow a trucking operation. Show up for this one with specific questions about your own administrative bottlenecks.

12:15 PM — Access to Capital: Closing the Small Business Gap (Visa)

This is the session that small carriers specifically need to hear right now. The capital access article published on this platform recently covered the foundational steps — business credit profiles, banking separation, loan product selection. This session is likely to expand on that from the perspective of practitioners who work with small businesses on capital applications every day.

The “small business gap” in the session title refers to the documented disparity between what small businesses need to operate and grow and what the lending market actually makes available to them. For trucking specifically, that gap shows up as equipment financing that requires perfect credit and two years of clean books, working capital products that cost 30% APR because the operation does not qualify for conventional lending, and a general absence of lenders who understand that a carrier with $400,000 in annual revenue and thin margins is not the same credit risk as a retail store with similar numbers. If this session covers what makes a trucking operation “bankable” — which the May 6 session on being a “Triple Threat” directly addresses — the combination of the two days builds toward a practical capital access strategy that most small carriers have never had laid out for them.

2:15 PM — Becoming Bankable: What Makes You a “Triple Threat” for Loans, Deposits, and Growth (Grasshopper Bank)

The Triple Threat framework — the combination of lending readiness, deposit relationship, and growth trajectory that makes a small business attractive to a bank rather than just tolerable — is exactly the framework missing from most small carrier financial planning. The operators who get the best loan terms are not just the ones with the best credit scores. They are the ones who have built a relationship with a financial institution that understands their business, sees consistent cash flow through a business deposit account, and can project a growth trajectory that makes the loan look like a managed risk rather than a speculative one.

Grasshopper Bank is a digital bank that has built specifically around small business relationships. Their perspective on what makes a borrower a triple threat will be more practically applicable to a three-truck carrier than advice from a large regional bank whose small business lending is an afterthought to their commercial portfolio.

3:30 PM — How to Win Your Next Contract: Write Stronger Proposals, Stand Out, and Win More Bids (Verizon)

The growth strategy article on this platform covered direct shipper development as the highest-return path for small carriers looking to move off the load board. This session addresses the mechanics of that transition — specifically how to write a proposal or capability statement that wins business rather than getting filed and forgotten.

Most small carriers who attempt direct shipper outreach make the same mistake: they send a rate sheet. A rate sheet tells a shipper what you charge. It does not tell them why you are more reliable than the carrier they are already using, what lanes you know, what your on-time performance looks like, or why adding you to their routing guide reduces their coverage risk. A compelling carrier capability statement — the trucking equivalent of a winning contract proposal — covers all of those things in a format a shipping manager can actually evaluate. This session should produce a practical framework for that document regardless of your industry.

4:00 PM — Hiring Secrets: Staff Up Smart and Fast (Paychex)

For small fleet owners managing two or more trucks, the driver management problem is the growth constraint that nobody talks about enough. Finding qualified drivers, vetting them efficiently, structuring compensation that retains them longer than three months, and managing the paperwork around employment compliance — all of it is time and money that most small carriers spend inefficiently because they have never been taught how to do it right.

The Paychex perspective on hiring is built around the small business context specifically. Their guidance on what works for fast, cost-effective hiring at small scale is more applicable to a five-truck operation than anything produced for a large fleet context.

Wednesday, May 6

11:25 AM — Built to Stay Open: The New Standard for Business Continuity (T-Mobile)

Business continuity planning in trucking typically means equipment backup and driver availability. This session likely expands that frame to include the digital and communication infrastructure that a modern small carrier depends on — dispatch systems, ELD connectivity, load board access, customer communication — and what happens to operations when any of those fail.

For small carriers who run their entire operation through a smartphone and a few cloud platforms, the vulnerability surface is real and underappreciated. A dispatch system that goes down during a critical load window, a communication failure that prevents proof of delivery from reaching the broker in time to avoid a disputed invoice, or a cybersecurity event that locks you out of your TMS are all business continuity problems that most small carriers have no plan for. The session framing around “the new standard” suggests it will address what a modern, practical continuity plan actually looks like for a small business — not a Fortune 500 disaster recovery program, but the decisions and backups that keep a small operation running when something breaks.

12:10 PM — Protecting Your Business from Risk and Fraud (Visa)

This is the session that has become more urgent in the freight market specifically over the past 24 months. Freight fraud — double brokering, load theft, identity fraud using hijacked carrier authorities, and the invoice manipulation schemes that have cost small carriers tens of thousands of dollars — has accelerated significantly as the compliance environment has become more complex.

The FMCSA crackdown on chameleon carriers has made carrier identity verification more important than ever, and the fraud protection conversation applies both ways: protecting your operation from being defrauded by bad actors in the freight market, and protecting your business identity from being used by others to commit fraud. A carrier whose DOT number gets used by a chameleon operation is not just a victim — they are exposed to liability and regulatory scrutiny that can threaten their own authority. Understanding how to protect your business identity, your payment systems, and your customer relationships from fraud is no longer optional operational knowledge.

1:05 PM — Getting Ahead with AI: Google Coaches Share Their Favorite Tips

The follow-up to Tuesday’s AI session with practical implementation guidance. Where the first session is likely to frame the opportunity, this one should get into specific tools and workflows. For a carrier or dispatcher, the question to bring is specific: what are the three tasks in my operation that consume the most time relative to their value, and is there an AI tool that addresses each one? Walking in with that question focused on your actual workflow will produce more usable output than attending as a general observer.

2:35 PM — Beyond the Storefront: Smart Strategies for Small Business Growth (Amazon)

The growth conversation from Amazon’s perspective will likely center on e-commerce supply chain dynamics and last-mile delivery opportunities — which intersects with trucking directly for carriers who serve distribution centers, fulfillment centers, or regional delivery networks. As e-commerce continues to drive corrugated demand and packaging freight volumes, the carriers who understand where the growth is happening in the goods economy are the ones positioned to develop the shipper relationships that capture it.

4:10 PM — Video 101 for Small Business: How to Capture Professional Content Using What You Already Have (America’s SBDC)

This session is for carriers who have been told they need to be on social media or who have been watching other operators build an audience online and wondered whether it is worth doing. The practical answer is yes — for a small carrier trying to develop direct shipper relationships, a professional online presence that demonstrates reliability, industry knowledge, and operational standards is now part of the vetting process that shippers run before awarding freight. A LinkedIn profile with documented loads delivered, a brief video demonstrating your operation, or a short-form video that shows how you handle cargo — none of that requires a production budget. It requires knowing what to do with the phone in your pocket. This session covers exactly that.

Why This Week Matters More Than Usual

National Small Business Week has run annually since 1963. Most years it is a recognition event — awards, ceremonies, speeches about the importance of small business to the economy. The 2026 Virtual Summit is different in its practical orientation. Every session on the schedule is educational rather than ceremonial, and several of them address problems that are acute in trucking right now: capital access in a tight lending environment, fraud protection in a market where identity theft has become a business risk, AI tools that reduce administrative burden for operations without support staff, and the contract development skills that move a carrier off spot freight dependency.

The format is the point. Two days, free, online, starting at 11 AM Eastern. A carrier who picks three sessions across the two days based on their current business challenges will leave with more actionable information than most trucking conferences deliver at ten times the cost.

Registration takes two minutes at sba.gov/national-small-business-week/virtual-summit. The summit is May 5 and 6. If you are running this business — one truck or twenty — there is something on this schedule that is worth two hours of your time this week.

The post The Federal Government Is Offering Two Days of Free Business Education This Week. Here Is Why Every Small Carrier Should Show Up. appeared first on FreightWaves.

That is not an accident. That is the FMCSA compliance crackdown of 2026 showing up in the used equipment market, and if you do not understand what is driving it, you are going to buy someone else’s problem and wonder for the next 18 months why the truck is costing you more than it should.

Why the Lots Are Full Right Now

The FMCSA has spent the first four months of 2026 executing what its own acting division administrator described as the largest regulatory enforcement action the agency has undertaken in years. Thousands of non-domiciled CDLs have been removed from the system. Nearly 3,000 CDL training providers were pulled from the Training Provider Registry. More than 80 electronic logging devices have been revoked from the approved list. And the agency has cracked down on chameleon carriers — operations that dissolved under one DOT number and reopened under another to escape their safety record — with new identity verification requirements that make that playbook far harder to run.

The cost difference between operating compliantly and operating non-compliantly has been estimated at $1,000 per month per truck on the low end. Carriers who were making that calculation in favor of cutting corners are now finding the margin has evaporated — and the enforcement environment has made the risk untenable. The result is predictable: exits. Fast ones. Carriers surrendering authority, parking trucks, and pushing equipment back to dealers before the next inspection, the next audit, or the next renewal cycle forces the issue.

Meanwhile, freight recession economics have been grinding on operations that were already thin. The operators who could absorb three years of compressed margins while staying fully compliant are the ones still running. The ones who could not — or who were never fully compliant to begin with — are the ones whose trucks are on those dealer lots right now.

This is where it gets important for a carrier considering a used truck purchase: you do not know which category a given truck came from. And the truck will not tell you unless you ask it the right way.

What the Odometer Does Not Know

A truck with 345,000 miles on the odometer sounds like a truck with 345,000 miles of story. But the odometer only counts distance. It does not count the hours the engine spent idling. It does not count how many times the driver overrode the idle shutdown system to keep the bunk air conditioner running through the night. It does not count the cumulative hours the coolant level ran low, or how many minutes the oil pressure dropped below the threshold where the lubrication film starts to break down. It does not count how many times a water-in-fuel fault fired and nobody fixed it.

The engine control module knows all of those things. It has been recording them since the day the truck left the factory. Every fault code, every abuse event, every protection trigger, every driver behavior pattern — it is all sitting in the ECM, available to anyone who knows how to pull it, and invisible to anyone who does not.

What a real pre-purchase diagnostic pull from a platform like JPRO or Cummins INSITE produces is a different kind of odometer. One that measures not just distance but how that distance was accumulated, and at what cost to the engine systems that generate the truck’s remaining value.

Take a 2022 International LT625 with a Cummins X15 and 345,000 miles. On paper, it is early in its lifecycle — the X15 is built for well over a million miles under proper care, and a 2022 model at under 350,000 miles should have enormous useful life remaining. That assessment holds up on this particular truck: one inactive fault code, all warning lamps off, DPF soot low, coolant normal. The diagnostic confirms what the odometer implied. The only flag is a 44.6% idle rate — nearly half the engine’s runtime spent idling rather than moving — which is above the industry benchmark of 25 to 35% and tells you something about how this truck was operated. Not a deal breaker on an engine this young and otherwise clean, but a legitimate negotiating lever and a flag to pull maintenance records and check oil change intervals.

That is what a clean unit looks like in the data. Not every unit on those lots right now looks like that.

What a Problem Unit Looks Like

Now consider a different Cummins X15, similar platform, similar mileage on paper — 324,000 miles, 18,000 engine hours. Before you even open the fault codes, one number stops the conversation: 365 hours of cumulative low coolant level. Not a single bad fill. Not an air-bleed event after a service. Three hundred and sixty-five hours — more than two full work weeks of accumulated operating time — with the coolant level sensor reporting low.

To understand what 365 hours of low coolant means for an engine like the X15, you need to understand what the cooling system does. It is not just keeping the engine from overheating. It is protecting the EGR cooler, regulating oil temperature, managing combustion heat, and preserving the thermal stability that keeps the head gasket seated and the cylinder liners from cycling through stress ranges they were not designed for. An EGR cooler failure on a Cummins X15 — one of the most documented failure modes on this platform — is a near-certain outcome of repeated thermal stress from inadequate coolant. The parts and labor to replace it run $3,000 to $6,000. A compromised head gasket runs significantly more. Neither failure appears in the CARFAX. Neither shows up on the lot’s pricing sheet.

The same truck adds more to the story. Five hours of oil temperature above 235 degrees Fahrenheit — sustained, not momentary — at temperatures where the lubrication film begins to break down and bearing surfaces start doing real work without proper protection. Oil pressure dropping below 5 psi for cumulative seconds that add up beyond a startup blip. An engine protection event for exhaust gas pressure above normal operating range. And a fault code cluster where seven aftertreatment sensors all went offline at the exact same timestamp — not seven independent failures, but one electrical event that killed communication with the entire aftertreatment system simultaneously, pointing at a failing battery, a corroded ground, or an intermittent alternator that will produce chronic, unpredictable shop visits for whoever buys this truck.

That truck has 324,000 miles. On the lot, parked next to the clean LT625, it might carry a similar price. The odometer does not explain the difference. The ECM does.

The Water in Fuel Problem Nobody Can See

The worst finding in a recent series of pre-purchase diagnostics reviewed for this article was not a mechanical failure. It was a fault code that had been firing 3,524 times over 2,169 engine hours — meaning it had been active for approximately 15% of the engine’s total runtime — with the most recent occurrence 45 minutes before the diagnostic pull.

The fault was water in the fuel system.

There are two ways to read a water-in-fuel sensor firing 3,524 times. Either the sensor itself has failed and has been generating false alerts for years — in which case the operator ignored a maintenance code for 2,169 hours, which tells you something important about how they managed this truck. Or there has been actual water contamination in the fuel system for an extended period — in which case the injector tips have been exposed to a corrosive environment, the high-pressure fuel pump wear surfaces have been compromised, and microbial growth in the fuel tank is a real possibility.

You cannot see either of those outcomes by looking at the truck. You cannot see them in the DPF soot level or the regen history. You cannot see them in a test drive. The truck will start, run, and pull a load — right up until the moment an injector fails, at which point the repair bill on a Cummins X15 for a full injector set runs $8,000 to $15,000. Budget more if the high-pressure pump needs to come out with it.

The fault was in the ECM the whole time. It took a $300 diagnostic pull to find it.

The Audit Trail That Shows You What They Tried to Hide

A pre-purchase diagnostic from a tool like Cummins INSITE does something else that most buyers do not know is possible: it pulls an ECM audit trail. Every time a service tool has connected to this engine — every diagnostic session, every fault code reset, every parameter change — it leaves a timestamp and a record of what was done.

In one of the high-risk trucks reviewed here, the audit trail showed a comprehensive ECM reconfiguration at roughly the midpoint of the engine’s life: a single session that touched cruise control settings, road speed governor, transmission parameters, vehicle speed sensor, maximum vehicle speed, axle ratio, tire revolutions, fan clutch, engine brake, PTO setup, low idle, gear down protection, calibration download, starter lockout, remote throttle, and tire wear adjustment. That is not a routine service call. That is someone who rebuilt the operating parameters of this engine’s computer at 7,900 hours for reasons that are not documented anywhere in the records the seller provided.

Every truck in that same evaluation series also showed PowerSpec access — a dealer-level tool — within 48 hours of the diagnostic pull. The access sessions modified idle shutdown settings, cruise control, road speed governors, aftertreatment lamp setups, and fuel economy parameters. A pattern of pre-sale ECM adjustments across multiple units from the same dealer source is not coincidence. It is preparation — and the question it raises is what those adjustments were designed to affect.

None of that shows up on the sticker. The audit trail does.

What You Should Do Before You Sign Anything

The diagnostic tools exist. JPRO gives you the surface read — fault codes, live data, component communication status. Cummins INSITE gives you the engine’s full lifetime history: fault counts and durations, abuse event logs, driver behavior profiles, fuel economy data, regen history, ECM audit trail, duty cycle maps. A JPRO pull costs roughly $150 to $300. An INSITE pull through a Cummins dealer runs similarly. On a truck that costs $80,000 to $150,000, that is the cheapest insurance available and the only due diligence that actually reads what the engine has to say about itself.

Any dealer who will not allow a diagnostic pull before purchase is telling you something. A truck with a clean engine history does not become harder to sell because someone ran a diagnostic. It becomes easier. Resistance to a pre-purchase diagnostic is, at this point in a market flooded with compliance-exit equipment, itself a flag.

Beyond the diagnostic, pull Cummins Insite on any X15 or X12. Request maintenance records specifically for oil change intervals — a truck with a heavy idle history and inconsistent oil changes has been degrading the engine from two directions simultaneously. Check the transmission fluid condition on any Eaton Endurant — pull a sample for analysis, or at minimum inspect color and smell. Have a technician check for idle-related carbon buildup around the EGR system. And verify the DPF condition through Insite’s regen history, not just the current soot level reading — a DPF that reads low soot right now may have been stressed significantly over its life in ways the current reading does not reflect.

The deal flow that compliance exits are generating right now is real. There are trucks on lots that represent genuine value — clean units at reasonable prices from operators who are exiting for economic or regulatory reasons and whose equipment was well-maintained through their tenure. Those trucks are worth buying at the right price, and the diagnostic will confirm it.

The trucks that are not worth buying at any price are also out there. Same lots. Sometimes similar prices. The difference between them is in the ECM, not on the sticker — and the only way to know which one you are looking at is to read what the engine has been recording since the day it left the factory.

Pull the diagnostic. Read the data. Buy the truck or walk away with information. The alternative is buying the truck and finding out the information later, one repair bill at a time.

Commonly Asked Questions

Q: What does a pre-purchase diagnostic actually cost and where do I get one done?

A JPRO diagnostic — which reads fault codes, live data, and component communication across all major ECUs — runs approximately $150 to $300 at a commercial truck shop with the tool. A Cummins INSITE pull, which produces the full engine history including abuse logs, fault duration data, driver behavior profile, fuel economy breakdown, and ECM audit trail, is available through any authorized Cummins dealer. Budget roughly $200 to $400+ for a full INSITE session. Some dealers will do both in a combined pre-purchase inspection package.

Q: The dealer says the truck just went through a full service and is ready to go. Isn’t that enough?

A service addresses what the shop was asked to address. It does not produce a 14,000-hour history of oil temperature abuse, a 2,169-hour record of water-in-fuel faults, or a 365-hour log of low coolant operation. A fresh oil change and a new set of filters on a truck with a damaged engine is still a truck with a damaged engine — it just smells like fresh oil. The service receipt tells you what happened last week. The INSITE pull tells you what happened over the engine’s entire life. You need both.

Q: If a truck has high idle time, is it automatically a bad buy?

Not automatically — but it needs to be priced and inspected accordingly. High idle time accelerates oil degradation, increases ring and cylinder liner wear at low combustion pressure, and creates DPF soot loading from unloaded low-RPM operation. The impact depends on whether oil changes were kept current, whether the EGR system has been serviced, and whether the DPF has been maintained. A truck with 44% idle time and documented consistent maintenance at appropriate intervals is a different asset than one with 58% idle time and no service records. The idle rate is the flag that tells you what to inspect, not necessarily the reason to walk.

The post The Used Truck Market Just Got Flooded With Equipment You Need to Inspect Before You Touch appeared first on FreightWaves.

Nearshoring fuels 800K-square-foot industrial build in El Paso

A Dallas-based developer has broken ground on a major cross-border industrial project in El Paso, Texas, underscoring the region’s growing role as a key gateway for U.S.-Mexico trade and nearshoring activity.

Formation Interests announced it has begun construction on FORM375 at Paso Del Norte, an 800,000-square-foot industrial park located adjacent to the Zaragoza port of entry. 

The four-building project totals about 802,604 square feet and includes a 513,074-square-foot cross-dock facility designed to streamline freight movement across the border.

The development sits next to one of the busiest inland trade corridors in North America and is aimed at reducing “last-mile” friction for cross-border shipments by placing logistics and manufacturing operations directly at the port of entry.

“At a time when global supply chains are rapidly shifting, the opportunity to develop this site could not have occurred at a better time,” Formation Interests CEO Adam Herrin said in a news release, citing El Paso’s proximity to Ciudad Juárez and its expanding manufacturing base.

The project comes as trade volumes through El Paso continue to surge, reinforcing the city’s role as a critical node in North American supply chains.

According to WorldCity data, total trade at the El Paso Bridge of the Americas reached $3.19 billion in February, an 86.66% increase year over year. Exports totaled $1.67 billion, while imports hit $1.52 billion during the month.

Mexico dominates the port’s trade flows, accounting for the vast majority of cross-border activity. In February alone, trade with Mexico totaled $2.72 billion, representing the top trading partner by a wide margin.

Electronics and advanced manufacturing goods are a major driver of volume through the region. Top exports included computer parts ($463 million) and computer chips ($250 million), while imports were led by computer parts ($441 million), computers ($246 million), and passenger vehicles ($204 million).

Overall, the El Paso port ranked No. 10 among U.S. border crossings and No. 33 across all ports of entry by trade value, accounting for about 0.71% of total U.S. trade.

Formation Interests said the Paso Del Norte site is positioned to capitalize on nearshoring trends, with a 2.5 million-strong binational workforce supporting manufacturing activity on both sides of the border.

The project is being marketed as a “zero-distance” logistics solution, allowing companies to reduce transit times and costs tied to border congestion, where crossing delays can exceed two hours.

The campus will also feature infrastructure designed for high-power users, including semiconductor and AI-related manufacturing, reflecting the shift toward higher-value industrial production along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Hutchison Ports adds electric cranes at Port of Manzanillo

Hutchison Ports TIMSA is investing more than $17.5 million to upgrade operations at Mexico’s Port of Manzanillo, adding two electric mobile harbor cranes as part of a broader modernization push, according to a news release. 

The cranes, which arrived April 15 aboard the vessel BBC Aquamarine, can handle vessels up to 15,500 TEUs with a lifting capacity of 100 tons and reach across 22 container rows.

The additions bring the terminal’s total crane fleet to eight units, boosting berth productivity and capacity as trade volumes grow along Mexico’s Pacific coast. The equipment is also expected to improve energy efficiency and support Hutchison Ports’ net-zero strategy, which targets a 54.6% reduction in Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 2033.

Hong Kong-based Hutchison Ports operates six terminals at four seaports and one inland port in Mexico, serving 20,000 customers. The company operates ports in 26 countries around the world.

Burlington breaks ground on 2M-square-foot distribution center near Phoenix

Burlington Stores (NYSE: BURL) has begun construction on a nearly 2 million-square-foot distribution center in Buckeye, Arizona, marking a major expansion of its logistics network in the Southwest. 

The facility, located in the Westpark 360 Industrial Park, is expected to open in 2028 and will be one of the retailer’s most advanced supply chain hubs, according to a news release.

The automated center will feature advanced sorting systems, custom software and upgraded workstations designed to improve speed, flexibility and efficiency across Burlington’s off-price retail operations.

At full capacity, the project is expected to create thousands of jobs in the Phoenix-area market, while supporting Burlington’s broader growth strategy, which includes adding more than 100 new stores nationwide by the end of 2026.

The post Borderlands Mexico: Nearshoring fuels 800K-square-foot industrial build in El Paso appeared first on FreightWaves.

Chart of the Week:  LTL Monthly Cost per Hundredweight, Van Contract Rate Per Mile Initial Report – USA SONAR: LTL.USA, VCRPM1.USA

After a fairly sluggish start to the year, less-than-truckload (LTL) rates are now showing the highest levels of upward pressure since the exit of Yellow in the summer of 2023.

The LTL monthly cost per hundredweight index measures pricing change momentum in the LTL market. This index tracks directional changes in the LTL pricing environment based on transactional data.

This does not necessarily mean that all contracts increased simultaneously, but that as new bids and general rate increases work through the market, they are being priced at roughly 12.5% higher levels than at this point last year — and 29% higher than in May 2021.

The dry van truckload contract rate index VCRPM1 showed upward pressure building on truckload rates in November, most likely in the form of route guide failures and tender waterfalling rather than permanent rate increases. The fact that this index continues moving higher reflects that truckload rates are increasing more sustainably.

The LTL market tends to follow the truckload environment by roughly three to six months and is almost entirely based on contracts or blanket pricing agreements lasting at least a year. The notable exception occurred in 2023, when the third-largest national LTL carrier, Yellow, exited the market.

LTL differs from the truckload market in several ways, but one of the most significant is that LTL carriers do not turn down loads due to lack of availability — instead, general service levels deteriorate as linehaul networks (the truckload moves between hubs) come under strain.

This close connection to the truckload market is what causes LTL rates to eventually follow truckload pricing trends, but at a much slower pace. This recent response is running roughly on schedule, but is stronger than expected.

The nuance here is that the truckload market turn began during the holiday peak season, which typically does not affect the LTL market, as LTL is less tied to retail shipping and replenishment.

December and January are typically the slowest months of the year for LTL, as manufacturing plants close and shipping and receiving dock hours are reduced. Winter weather also has a strong influence, as networks stall — though unlike in the truckload market, weather does not necessarily lead to rate increases.

There is no meaningful spot market for LTL, so urgency is never reflected in real time; shippers have no centralized venue to bid for capacity against one another. In many cases, shippers use the LTL market as a relief valve for truckload tightness by breaking up full truckloads and moving them through the LTL market for guaranteed capacity — though at lower service levels and higher prices. The average weight per shipment has increased approximately 11% since the start of the year, suggesting this is probably occurring.

This makes the current LTL pricing surge all the more notable, as it takes a significant market shift to produce sharp changes in this space. Some of this sharpness may be a correction for softness in the first two months of the year: rates showed a 1.7% year-over-year decline in January and a 1.2% decline in February. The March print more than corrected for those declines, posting a 7% year-over-year jump.

The LTL market is typically less volatile than the truckload market, as there are far fewer providers and, as noted, rates are almost entirely negotiated over long periods. This also means that increases are stickier and take longer to unwind.

About the Chart of the Week

The FreightWaves Chart of the Week is a chart selection from SONAR that provides an interesting data point to describe the state of the freight markets. A chart is chosen from thousands of potential charts on SONAR to help participants visualize the freight market in real time. Each week a Market Expert will post a chart, along with commentary, live on the front page. After that, the Chart of the Week will be archived on FreightWaves.com for future reference.

SONAR aggregates data from hundreds of sources, presenting the data in charts and maps and providing commentary on what freight market experts want to know about the industry in real time.

The post Less-than-truckload rates have sharp response to broader market turn appeared first on FreightWaves.

Schneider (NYSE: SNDR) reported adjusted earnings per share of 12 cents in the period, which was 2 cents above consensus but 4 cents lower year over year. Consolidated revenue of $1.4 billion was in line with the prior year and just below the $1.42 billion consensus estimate.

Truckload revenue increased 1% y/y to $618 million, excluding fuel surcharges. A 1% decline in average trucks in service was more than offset by a 3% increase in revenue per truck per week (productivity). The company noted productivity gains across both its network (one-way) and dedicated fleets.

Productivity increased 7.3% y/y at its one-way fleet. The increase was mostly driven by improved truck utilization, with better pricing helping to a lesser degree. The company said price renewals are currently at the highest levels since 2021, noting an expectation for mid- to high-single-digit one-way contract rate increases through bid season. It will also seek double-digit rate increases with transactional shippers, as pricing at those accounts fell the most during the downturn.

The company said that some dedicated customers are looking to grow truck counts, with a focus on carrier partners providing high tender acceptance. It sold dedicated service on 150 trucks in the quarter but noted some near-term churn.

The TL unit reported a 96.7% adjusted operating ratio (inverse of operating margin), which was 80 basis points worse y/y.

Intermodal revenue declined 3% y/y to $254 million (excluding fuel), as a slight increase in load count was offset by a 4% decline in revenue per load. A shorter length of haul led to the yield decline. Schneider is seeing incremental intermodal conversion opportunities and said it has enough containers to accommodate double-digit volume growth.

Intermodal reported a 95.7% OR, which was 100 bps worse y/y. Lower yields and higher maintenance costs were headwinds. Container turns improved 1% in the period.

Logistics revenue (excluding fuel) fell 6% y/y to $312 million, as lower volumes were only partially offset by higher revenue per load. Even with a net revenue margin squeeze due to surging spot rates (higher purchased transportation costs), OR was only 30 bps worse y/y at 97.9%.

2026 outlook reiterated

Schneider reiterated its 2026 adjusted EPS guidance range of 70 cents to $1, noting “macro uncertainty has grown” in recent weeks. The outlook bracketed an 85-cent consensus estimate at the time of the print. (The company reported full-year 2025 adjusted EPS of 63 cents.)

Net debt leverage ended the quarter at 0.3x, flat with year-end 2025. Schneider reiterated net capex guidance of $400 million to $450 million for the year. Net capex totaled $289 million in 2025. It plans to use free cash flow to fund share repurchases, dividends and M&A.

Schneider previously announced President and CEO Mark Rourke will become executive chairman of the board on July 1. At that time, Jim Filter, Schneider executive vice president and president of transportation and logistics, will succeed Rourke as the company’s president and CEO. Filter is also expected to be appointed to the board at a later date.

Shares of SNDR were up 4.9% at 11:07 a.m. EDT on Friday compared to the S&P 500, which was up 0.5%.

More FreightWaves articles by Todd Maiden:

• XPO could soon see sub-80% ORs
• Saia eyes margin turnaround amid improving demand
• Old Dominion eyeing y/y margin improvement in Q2

The post Schneider targeting significant rate recovery in bid season appeared first on FreightWaves.

The funding, awarded through the U.S. Maritime Administration’s Port Infrastructure Development Program, will support construction of a new container yard and a new exit gate at Bayport. Port Houston will also contribute roughly $56 million in matching funds for the project.

Port officials said the improvements are designed to handle growing cargo volumes while improving truck flow and safety. The project is expected to increase capacity by about 440,000 TEUs and reduce congestion by cutting truck turn times, saving millions of hours over the life of the project.

Port Houston is continuing to handle strong cargo volumes and heavy truck traffic across its terminals, underscoring the scale of activity moving through the gateway.

Chief Port Operations Officer Ryan Mariacher said the port handled nearly 14 million tons of cargo through the first quarter, with container terminals rebounding to a monthly record of about 180,000 loaded containers and surpassing 1 million TEUs for the quarter. 

“We’re seeing about 10,000 trucks a day going through both terminals, and that is held pretty steady,” Mariacher said at the port’s commission meeting on Tuesday. He added that vessel calls are up 9% year to date, with 523 ships calls.

Related: Port Houston March rebound pushes Q1 volumes past 1M TEUs

70 years of containerization

The announcement also comes as Port Houston marked a major milestone in maritime history. Tuesday marked the 70th anniversary of containerization at the port, when the SS Ideal X arrived in 1956 carrying 58 converted containers from Port Newark, New Jersey.

That voyage, pioneered by trucking entrepreneur Malcolm McLean, is widely credited with launching modern container shipping. The ship’s arrival in Houston demonstrated how standardized containers could dramatically speed up cargo handling—cutting loading times from days to hours and laying the foundation for today’s global supply chains.

The post Port Houston lands $48M federal grant for Bayport expansion  appeared first on FreightWaves.

“Families have lost loved ones, communities have suffered overwhelming sadness, and the nation has witnessed yet another catastrophic disaster involving an aircraft with a long-documented history of mechanical problems,”Rep. Morgan McGarvey said in a letter to the FAA last Friday. “We have a collective responsibility to ensure that no additional lives are put at risk by an aircraft whose design and operational history have repeatedly demonstrated an unacceptable level of danger.”

UPS Flight 2976 crashed during take off from Louisville International Airport as the left engine and a structural pylon detached from the wing shortly after the front landing gear lifted, igniting a fire. The cargo jet never got higher than 30 feet off the ground before striking a warehouse just beyond the Louisville airport’s perimeter and slamming into a storage yard and other buildings. Fourteen people died in the crash, including the three pilots.

Within days, the FAA banned MD-11s from flying until the entire fleet is thoroughly inspected and any necessary repairs are completed. The National Transportation Safety Board’s preliminary investigation found fatigue cracks in a structural section that held the engine to the left wing. 

The letter asserts the tragedy in Louisville was the result of a broader pattern of structural deficiencies, citing a long-documented history of mechanical problems as cause for the FAA to permanently ground the model of aircraft from service.

The MD-11 has experienced at least ten hull loss accidents since entering service in 1990 – the highest hull loss rate (per million departures) of any widebody commercial jet airliner still flying within the U.S. – according to Boeing. The manufacturer acquired McDonnell Douglas in 1997 and is responsible for supporting airlines that fly the MD-11. 

“Investigators, pilots, and operators have continuously documented the aircraft’s tendencies toward instability on landing, center-of-gravity sensitivity, and structural stress around the engine pylons. Multiple cargo carriers have already decided that the aircraft poses unacceptable risk and have since retired the aircraft from their fleets voluntarily…. With a clear trend of users phasing out the MD-11, the FAA is one of the last major entities to have taken no action on removing this aircraft from commercial service,” wrote McGarvey, a Democrat. “Given the MD-11’s safety record, the NTSB’s preliminary report on the Louisville crash, and the FAA’s statutory obligations, I urge the FAA to take immediate steps to permanently ground the MD-11,” wrote McGarvey.

Only three U.S. airlines operate the aging MD-11. UPS (NYSE: UPS) in January decided to retire the 28 remaining MD-11s it owns. Western Global Airlines has not publicly commented on the MD-11’s future. FedEx (NYSE: FDX), however, is ramping up preparations to operate the plane again as soon as the FAA gives the okay. 

According to internal FedEx communiqués obtained by FreightWaves, FedEx is planning for the return to service of two MD-11s in May and the subsequent reactivation of all 27 freighters it owns. FedEx told air operations employees that Boeing has developed a part that will correct the MD-11’s structural problem and make the plane safe to operate. Pilots have been told to take refresher classes for the MD-11 and a town hall meeting is scheduled for next week to update airline personnel on how the planes will be reincorporated into the fleet and explain the Boeing fix.

Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.

Write to Eric Kulisch at ekulisch@freightwaves.com.

RELATED STORIES:

FedEx prepares to reactivate grounded MD-11 fleet in May

NTSB links fatigue cracks to fatal crash of UPS cargo jet

The post Kentucky congressman urges FAA to permanently shut down MD-11 aircraft appeared first on FreightWaves.

Traffix, the Ontario-based $1 billion gross revenue freight brokerage, paints a clear picture in its April 2026 report: demand is recovering while reduced capacity is driving a more reactive and volatile market. 

“It’s pretty clear we’re heading into a new cycle,” said Alex Fuller, Senior Director of Revenue Management and Solutions at Traffix, in an interview with FreightWaves. “People might have thought that January was a hangover from peak and February [volatility] was [caused by] weather. But in March and April, we’re clearly moving into a new cycle.”

The cycle Traffix describes is the classic freight-market rhythm, only this time the upswing arrives against a backdrop of structurally lower capacity. During the prolonged low-rate period of 2023-2025, a meaningful amount of truckload capacity left the industry. Regulatory enforcement, including English-language requirements for drivers and heightened scrutiny of non-domiciled CDLs, has further constrained the driver pool. Class 8 truck orders were strong in Q1 2026, but much of that activity reflects fleet replacement rather than net expansion.

On the demand side, freight volumes have snapped back into growth mode. March 2026 volumes were up approximately 8% year-over-year and reached multi-year highs, according to SONAR data cited in the report. Lean inventories, stronger manufacturing orders, and rising imports are all contributing. The ISM Manufacturing PMI has returned to expansion territory for multiple consecutive months, with new orders, production growth, and imports feeding increased freight demand. Meanwhile, the Logistics Managers’ Index (LMI) Transportation Price Index has surged to its highest level since 2022, while the capacity index has dropped below 40—signaling a widening gap that is shifting pricing power back to carriers.

Fuel is adding accelerant to the fire. Diesel prices have increased sharply, up roughly 50% since early Q1 2026. Those costs are flowing through to transportation rates with minimal lag, amplifying an already tightening market. Yet Traffix and Fuller emphasize that fuel is not the primary driver. Linehaul rates (excluding fuel) are up approximately 30% year-over-year, confirming a genuine supply-demand imbalance.

Tender rejection rates have remained above 10% for more than two months, a level that reinforces the structurally tight market. “Higher rates should attract new capacity,” the report notes, “but this process will take time.” Fuller echoed that timeline: “Moving into a year or two of a normal freight cycle…for the next 6-12 months rates will continue to stay high and potentially get higher. We expect at least 12 months of higher rates before capacity can catch up.”

Mode-specific outlooks in the Traffix report underscore the breadth of the tightening. Dry-van rates are expected to remain elevated through mid-2026, supported by strong demand and tight capacity; contract increases will continue as shippers adjust to spot-market pressure. Flatbed markets are tightening rapidly due to construction, infrastructure, and industrial demand. Reefer capacity is tightening ahead of produce season, with seasonal volatility and elevated rates expected through summer. Intermodal volumes are projected to grow 10% year-over-year as shippers seek cost and capacity relief. Cross-border lanes show nuanced dynamics: Canada-U.S. capacity remains available with rates tracking broader truckload trends, while U.S.-Mexico lanes face localized constraints, especially in high-demand corridors like Laredo-Bajio, pushing rates gradually higher.

For shippers, the implications are immediate and budgetary. Traffix outlines three planning scenarios for the remainder of 2026:

1. Base Case (Volumes Stabilize, Capacity Tightens): Spot rates stay well above 2025 levels and contract rates continue rising. Expect freight costs 10-15% higher than 2025, particularly for spot-exposed shipments.

2. Tightening Case (Demand + Fuel Accelerate): Manufacturing recovery broadens, inventories stay lean, and diesel remains elevated. Plan for 15-20% cost inflation, with spot-exposed and shorter-haul lanes under the greatest pressure.

3. Softer Case (Demand Moderates): Economic growth cools and volumes flatten, but reduced carrier capacity prevents a return to loose-market conditions. Rates stabilize rather than fall meaningfully; budget 7-12% inflation versus 2025.

“Current market levels should be treated as a new floor, not a temporary spike,” the report stresses. For most shippers, a practical budgeting range is low-double-digit transportation inflation versus 2025, with meaningful upside risk in truckload, spot-heavy networks, temperature-controlled freight, and shorter-haul lanes.

Fuller’s on-the-ground perspective aligns closely. He notes that shipper reactions have evolved quickly. “In January and February there was a lot of denial,” he said. “By March and April, transportation managers have convinced their CFO to give them a bigger budget. Fuel helped accelerate that process.” Large CPG and food-and-beverage companies with their own fleets have been slower to accept increases, leveraging purchasing power to resist. Industrial and machinery shippers, facing expensive customer orders, have been far more open. “In some lanes, we’re up 30%,” Fuller added. “Broadly, 20% is a good number to think about for 2026 and that’s been a big shock for some shippers.”

Broader economic and policy factors are also in play. Tariffs, though quieter in headlines, continue rippling through supply chains. Some companies that built inventory ahead of potential duties are now shifting toward just-in-time strategies or accelerating nearshoring to Mexico, trends that Fuller says are gaining momentum and could further influence domestic trucking demand. Consumer uncertainty and the possibility of rising unemployment remain watch items, but Fuller sees 2026 as “going to be great, with the asterisk that unemployment could jump and take it off the rails.”

Traffix’s recommendations for shippers are pragmatic. First, budget for a higher baseline and treat current rates as the new normal. Second, lock in capacity strategically: contract rates are still catching up to spot; use bid cycles and mini-bids to secure space in core lanes before further resets. Third, reduce spot-market exposure by shifting toward contracted and diversified carrier networks. Finally, take a total-cost view, which means balancing transportation, inventory, and import expenses, because low freight rates are no longer the default lever for controlling landed costs.

After years of carrier exits and regulatory friction, the market has entered the phase where even modest demand growth produces outsized rate increases. Spot rates have already surged, contract rates are resetting upward, and linehaul rates have reached multi-year highs independent of fuel. For carriers, the environment offers relief and pricing power not seen since the pandemic peak. For shippers, the message is clear: the soft-market era is over. Those who adapt quickly by securing capacity, updating budgets, and rethinking network strategy will be best positioned to navigate the tighter, more volatile freight market ahead.

The post Traffix expects double-digit rate increases to hold through 2026 appeared first on FreightWaves.

So..how did we get here? I want to highlight a few real cases that illustrate exactly what this administration has spent a year trying to prevent.

The first involves a load that was quadruple-brokered before it found a chameleon carrier and a Russian CDL-licensed driver. One of the oldest and most reputable manufacturers in American industrial history gave the load to a freight broker. That broker could not find a carrier. He passed it to someone else. That person passed it to a friend. That friend passed it to a foreign-operated carrier. By the time the load found a driver, it had passed through four sets of hands, and no one along the way appears to have asked the basic questions: whether the driver held a valid commercial license, whether the carrier had operating authority, or whether the equipment met federal safety standards. The driver ran out of fuel on a busy interstate at night. He stopped in a live center lane of travel. The flashlights he had mounted as truck lights did not comply with federal regulations designed precisely to prevent what happened next. A father of three died. He was a commercial driver himself, a working man heading home, who encountered flashlights mounted to the rear of a trailer on a dark highway, with no meaningful warning that the vehicle ahead of him was at a standstill.

The second case involves a Romanian national who built a trucking company in the Chicago suburbs. He employed foreign drivers, many of them non-domiciled, many holding temporary credentials. His fleet grew to hundreds of trucks. His crash record grew with it. By the time FMCSA placed him out of service, his operation had been connected to twelve deaths, hundreds of crashes, and federal civil penalties approaching $900,000. FMCSA issued two separate out-of-service orders. The carrier dissolved and restarted under successor entities with overlapping equipment and operational infrastructure and continued putting trucks on American highways. One of those trucks killed a man named Brandon Rogers in Beaumont, Texas, in April 2023 while hauling freight dispatched by a Moldovan broker. His family is in litigation. I have written extensively about this case on FreightWaves. It is not isolated. It is the operating model of a specific class of carrier that the regulatory environment before April 28, 2025, was entirely inadequate to prevent.

Both of these cases exist because of gaps this administration is focused on closing.

On April 28, 2025, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy announced steps to rescind a dangerous Obama-era policy that had dismissed English language proficiency requirements for commercial motor vehicle drivers. At the direction of Secretary Duffy, FMCSA took immediate actions to strengthen English language enforcement, with Duffy stating that federal law is clear and that a driver who cannot sufficiently read or speak English and understand road signs is unqualified to drive a commercial motor vehicle in America and that this commonsense standard should never have been abandoned. 

Beginning June 25, 2025, ELP violations were once again included in the out-of-service criteria, ensuring consistent nationwide enforcement and reaffirming the Department’s commitment to roadway safety. That is the inspection standard that puts trucks out of service. It took less than two months from the date of the executive order to implement it operationally across all 50 states through the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance. 

In June 2025, Secretary Duffy announced a nationwide audit of state non-domiciled CDL issuance alongside a pro-trucker package that included millions to expand truck parking, removal of one-size-fits-all mandates, and modernization of driver resources. The audit findings were wild. In California alone, more than 25 percent of non-domiciled CDLs reviewed were improperly issued. In one case, California issued a CDL to a driver from Brazil with endorsements to drive a passenger bus and a school bus, valid for months after his legal presence had expired. More than 30 states were found to have been systematically issuing non-domiciled CDLs improperly. Twenty-eight states and jurisdictions were placed under special enforcement orders.

On September 29, 2025, FMCSA issued an emergency interim final rule closing the Employment Authorization Document pathway that had allowed unverified foreign nationals to obtain commercial driver’s licenses without consular screening. At least 17 fatal crashes and 30 deaths in 2025 alone were caused by non-domiciled drivers who will now be ineligible to get a license. The final rule was published in the Federal Register on February 13, 2026, and took effect on March 16, 2026. Non-domiciled CDL eligibility is now limited to H-2A, H-2B, and E-2 visa holders who have undergone interagency vetting. SAVE database verification is now mandatory before any state can issue a non-domiciled credential. Credentials expire at the end of the driver’s authorized period of stay, rather than for four-year terms, regardless of immigration status. This week a State Department spokesperson confirmed on background that commercial truck driver visa processing has resumed under strict new standards including verified English language skills, a prior history of safe commercial truck operation, and a valid or obtainable United States commercial driver’s license. 

On October 7, 2025, the Senate confirmed Derek Barrs as FMCSA Administrator. Barrs brings nearly 35 years of experience in law enforcement and roadway safety, including more than 25 years focused on commercial motor vehicle safety, having served as a Deputy Sheriff in Madison County, Florida, a Florida State Trooper, Florida Highway Patrol Chief, and five years in the private sector at HNTB Corporation before returning to federal service. He arrived at FMCSA with a law enforcement chief’s mindset and has applied it without hesitation.

More than 7,000 entry-level driver training providers have been removed from the ELDT registry to crack down on CDL mills. Over 80 electronic logging devices have been removed from the approved list and more than 400 recent ELD applications were denied due to intensified internal vetting. Fifteen hundred training providers were audited over one week by 300 FMCSA inspectors, resulting in a failure rate of more than 30 percent. The mills that had been producing paper credentials instead of qualified drivers are being removed from the system at a pace this agency has never operated at before. 

Barrs has put himself on the road. Barrs recently joined Georgia enforcement officials during Operation SafeDRIVE, working alongside CVE officers during traffic stops, inspections, and a K-9 program demonstration at Monroe County Inspection Stations. That is the FMCSA administrator doing roadside inspections alongside state officers. That is not something that happens at agencies run by career administrators who measure tenure in press releases.

At the Truckload Carriers Association convention in February 2026, Barrs told carrier executives that the agency is going to bite off more than it can chew but the team is going to keep chewing, and that the work done over the prior few months is just the beginning of what is planned to clean up the mess inside this industry. Outgoing TCA President Jim Ward told Barrs on stage at the same convention that when he had asked Barrs during his confirmation process what he could do for the truckload industry, Barrs answered enforce regulations, and that he was doing a great job at it. 

The administration has been deliberate in recruiting private-sector tools into the enforcement effort. Three hundred fifty FMCSA investigators cannot cover 700,000 trucking companies without a robust commercial intelligence infrastructure. The FMCSA has made efforts to integrate commercial data tools into its federal enforcement workflows. Those kinds of partnerships recognize what the industry has long known. The data to identify dangerous carriers, chameleon operators, fraudulent process agents, and unqualified drivers exists in real time in commercial databases. Enforcement agencies that leave those tools on the table are choosing to be less effective than they could be. This administration is not making that choice.

Monday on FreightWaves, we are releasing our full interview with FMCSA Administrator Derek Barrs discussing the year in review. The conversation covers what the administration built in twelve months, what he found when he stepped inside the agency after 35 years watching it from the outside, what implementing these reforms across 50 states and 700,000 carriers actually looked like on the ground, where the personnel and resource gaps still are, and where the agenda goes from here. If you operate in this industry, employ drivers, underwrite trucking risk, or litigate crashes, you should read it.

The cases still in litigation represent people who died before these reforms took effect. Their families deserve the accountability the system owes them and that work is proceeding in courtrooms across the country. The regulatory infrastructure that produced those deaths is being rebuilt in real time by the most active and aggressive administration in the history of American commercial motor vehicle safety policy.

Three days ago marked the one-year anniversary of the executive order that started it. On Monday, we hear from the man running the FMCSA about what year two looks like.

The post How an Executive Order reshaped highway safety appeared first on FreightWaves.

The change began around 2021. That is when fraud moved into the transaction itself. Loads were no longer being taken from yards or truck stops. They were being redirected before pickup ever happened. Identities were copied. Emails were manipulated. Legitimate companies were used as cover. The freight still moved, but control changed hands early.

This was not caused by a single tactic. It came from a system built for speed. Digital onboarding increased. Remote communication replaced in-person checks calls. Processes stayed the same while exposure increased. When the market slowed, the pressure to move quickly remained. That imbalance created an opening that continues to be exploited.

this started years ago, not weeks ago

What we are seeing now is not a new wave. It is the result of steady expansion. Early cases showed what was possible. Over time, those methods were repeated, tested, and refined. The activity spread across lanes, commodities, and regions without needing to change much at the surface level.

Groups behind these thefts are not relying on force. They are relying on consistency. The same patterns continue to work because they fit inside normal workflows. That is what makes them effective. They do not disrupt operations. They blend into them.

By the time attention reaches a national level, these methods are established. They have moved volume, created losses, and done most of the damage before they are formally recognized.

the risk is no longer physical

The supply chain was designed to keep freight moving with minimal friction. That design does not account for someone entering the process under false identity. Once access is gained, the rest of the system functions as expected. That is where control is lost.

This type of exposure does not show up the way traditional theft does. There is no immediate signal that something is wrong. The issue is only visible after the handoff has already taken place. At that point, options are limited and recovery becomes unlikely.

Parts of the industry have already adjusted to this reality. Verification is being applied at more than one point in the shipment. Identity is being confirmed closer to execution, not just at onboarding. The focus has shifted from appearance to proof.

The FBI raising concern brings attention, but it does not change the timeline. This has already been in motion. The gap is between when the problem began and when it became widely acknowledged.

Closing that gap is what matters now.

Click here for more articles on cargo theft and freight fraud by Phillip Brink.

The post The FBI is late to cargo theft, the industry isn’t appeared first on FreightWaves.

A MOU and the path to 500 Autonomous Trucks

The first step involves a memorandum of understanding (MOU). The MOU outlines the path to autonomous scale. The final commercial terms and timing for a binding agreement are expected to close later this year. Once finalized, the deal will help Hirschbach scale a nationwide network estimated to create 500 million driverless miles. For Aurora, this establishes a multi-year revenue stream, valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

“When early adopters see the benefits the Aurora Driver delivers for their business and their drivers, they don’t just stay the course – they scale quickly,” said Chris Urmson, co-founder and CEO of Aurora. “We’ve been lucky to have such a thoughtful and innovative partner since our early days and we look forward to growing with them. The industry is primed for this product, and our momentum toward meaningful commercial revenue is hitting a new gear.”

Driver as a Service Model Powers the Hybrid Network

Hirschbach is a leader in the refrigerated space and has 2,948 power units according to FMCSA SAFER data. The carrier will subscribe to Aurora’s Driver as a Service (DaaS) model, where Hirschbach owns the assets while Aurora supplies the virtual driver.

The release notes, “Customers have control and ownership over assets in DaaS, allowing them to maximize Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) savings while Aurora benefits from an expected high-margin and capital-efficient business.”

“The Aurora Driver will provide consistent 24/7 service to our customers, making it an important growth lever for our business,” said Richard Stocking, CEO of Hirschbach Motor Lines. “But autonomy isn’t just a business move – it’s a quality-of-life investment for our people. The Aurora Driver will handle the lengthier, less desirable routes, providing our drivers with greater flexibility. It’s a win-win.”

Hirschbach is an important customer for Aurora’s 1,000-mile route between Fort Worth and Phoenix. Aurora has delivered over 2,000 loads for Hirschbach totaling over 800,000 miles to date.

The expansion strategy is part of a hybrid network, with autonomous trucks handling long-haul Sun Belt routes, allowing Hirschbach drivers more focus on shorter routes and getting them home daily.

Hirschbach enlisted the help of its million-mile drivers in evaluating Aurora’s virtual driver performance before the launch of Aurora’s driverless operations along its inaugural Dallas-to-Houston route.

“We’re proud to deploy a hybrid network with our drivers and autonomous trucks as we move toward a safer, more efficient future for refrigerated freight,” added Stocking.

The post Aurora and Hirschbach expand partnership for 500 Aurora Driver-powered trucks appeared first on FreightWaves.

From geopolitical disruptions in the Middle East to upcoming enforcement events and summer demand patterns, the discussion highlighted a market transitioning from recovery into a more durable tightening cycle. Here are five key takeaways:

Iran conflict driving fuel volatility, but not derailing demand

Fuller said the ongoing conflict in Iran is having a clear impact on fuel markets, though the broader freight economy remains resilient.

“All of it is tied to Iran… high oil prices are a factor at Iran… but there’s nothing in any of the data that says that higher fuel costs… is sapping the U.S. economy,” Fuller said

Strickland noted that diesel volatility has been reactive to geopolitical developments, especially around the Strait of Hormuz.

“We saw this pretty significant spike in retail diesel… and then as we started to see the end of the military conflict… the price of diesel came down,” Strickland said.

Fuller, emphasizing that fuel costs alone are not dictating freight pricing power, said the “tightness in capacity enables motor carriers to have pricing power… not necessarily diesel.”

Strickland added that carriers are still recovering fuel costs through rates in a tightening environment. “If you look at what the rates are… you’ve been able to recover all of that and potentially more,” he said

April: inflection point or seasonal “speed bump”?

Both executives pushed back on the idea that April’s softer trends signal a reversal.

“April has been… just kind of a sideline,” Strickland said. “It’s not up and to the right the way we saw it in March.”

Fuller countered that the market remains far stronger than year-ago levels.

“We’re talking about rejection rates… at 12.7%… these are levels that we haven’t seen in years,” Fuller said.

He also pointed to stronger macro signals underpinning freight. “You’re starting to see broader economic data… indicating much stronger activity than most people expected.”

Strickland framed April as a typical seasonal trough rather than a turning point.

“April is historically a weak month… you end up in May with a massive acceleration,” Strickland said.

Roadcheck could tighten already constrained capacity

Looking ahead, both warned that the upcoming CVSA International Roadcheck could meaningfully disrupt capacity.

“We’re going to see capacity come off the roads… more than usual,” Fuller said.

He added that stricter enforcement and compliance scrutiny are already influencing driver behavior.

“Drivers know that the DOT is getting directives to really crack down… so I think we’re going to see more capacity taken off the road,” Fuller said.

Strickland said the impact could be amplified by an already tight market, adding “there is very little excess capacity… so the market is much more sensitive.”

Fuller expects rejection rates to spike during the enforcement period.

“We will get into the 16%–17% range for a week,” he said.

Summer demand signals point to stronger freight cycle

Both executives highlighted strong indicators heading into peak summer shipping.

“Demand has gotten stronger… and we’re seasonally about to go into a much stronger demand cycle,” Strickland said.

Fuller pointed to structural drivers beyond traditional retail.

“June is the biggest month of the year… you have produce, construction, industrial production—all coming together,” Fuller said.

He also emphasized that industrial activity—not consumer retail—is driving the current cycle. “What’s been driving this market is not consumer retail… it is largely industrial,” Fuller said.

Strickland added that volumes are already showing strength — “volumes are up 11% year over year… probably 12% to 13% now.”

Risks and opportunities shaping the road ahead

The webinar closed with a look at structural shifts that could reshape the freight market.

Fuller pointed to regulatory and legal risks, including broker liability and compliance crackdowns.

“This is going to be probably the biggest story of the summer… it will completely change the way brokers operate,” Fuller said.

He also highlighted capacity constraints tied to regulation, adding “you’re talking about the net impact… as much as 600,000 to 800,000 drivers.” 

Strickland noted that rate pressure is already building.

“We’re already at about a 10% increase… and we’re going to see that grow throughout the year,” Strickland said.

Fuller said the market has clearly moved past the downturn.

“There is no freight recession right now… we are clearly done with it,” he said.

The post State of Freight: Freight recession ‘over’ as demand builds into summer  appeared first on FreightWaves.

Schneider (NYSE: SNDR) reported adjusted earnings per share of 12 cents, 2 cents above the consensus estimate but 4 cents lower year over year. Consolidated revenue of $1.4 billion was flat y/y and just shy of the $1.42 billion consensus estimate.

Truckload revenue increased 1% y/y (excluding fuel surcharges) to $618 million as average trucks in service dipped 1% and revenue per truck per week increased 3%. The company noted utilization gains across both its network and dedicated fleets.

The TL unit reported a 96.7% adjusted operating ratio, which was 80 basis points worse y/y.

“In the first quarter, we saw the impact of structural supply rationalization which is driving the market toward more normal conditions,” said President and CEO Mark Rourke in a news release. “Strong execution on our cost and productivity actions, as well as the benefits of operating a diverse, nimble portfolio, allowed us to capitalize on opportunities and effectively navigate a quarter marked by disruptive weather and fuel volatility.”

Schneider reiterated 2026 adjusted EPS guidance of 70 cents to $1. The range bracketed an 85-cent consensus estimate at the time of the print. (The company reported full-year 2025 adjusted EPS of 63 cents.)

Shares of SNDR were up 1.8% in afterhours trading on Thursday.

The company will host a call to discuss first-quarter results at 4:30 p.m. EDT on Thursday.

More FreightWaves articles by Todd Maiden:

• XPO could soon see sub-80% ORs
• Saia eyes margin turnaround amid improving demand
• Old Dominion eyeing y/y margin improvement in Q2

The post First look: Schneider National Q1 results appeared first on FreightWaves.

DHL Express (XETRA: DHL) revenues slumped 1.9% to 6 billion euros, equivalent to $7 billion, but earnings before taxes and interest jumped 20.6% due to aggressive capacity management, cost discipline and yield management, according to financial results released on Thursday. Adjusted revenue was up 2%. Express has recorded seven consecutive quarters of operating profit as it ramps up its Fit for Growth campaign, which aims to take out more than $1.2 billion in structural costs over three years.

The revenue and profit increase was achieved even as average daily shipment volume for the time-definite international air product fell 6%, thanks to increased weight per shipment. Weight is a core metric for assessing asset utilization and network profitability because sales are substantially based on weight and yield. TDI weight per shipment is up 4.4% since 2019 and 2.9% year over year, excluding U.S. destinations — a big improvement from recent quarters.  

“This higher profitability, despite lower shipments, is not a coincidence, but the result of how we steer sales, pricing, and network cost in close alignment,” said Chief Financial Officer Melanie Kreis during an earnings briefing with analysts.

DHL’s investment in more modern, fuel-efficient Boeing 777 freighter aircraft since 2019, including the addition of several new 777-300 converted freighters in recent months, also played a role in margin expansion, CEO Tobias Meyer added. And the company is using artificial intelligence to better judge which vehicles need ad hoc repairs, as well as regular maintenance and tire renewal, which reduces repair shop visits and costs.

The Iran war, which began on Feb. 28, had little impact on DHL’s overall earnings during the quarter, he said.

By rerouting freighter aircraft and making other network adjustments, the division was able to respond to Iran war impacts and maintain service for customers. DHL , for example, was forced to temporarily suspend operations at its regional hub in Bahrain, but shifted the dedicated fleet to airports in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and Muscat, Oman, several days after the conflict started. Some long-range aircraft were relocated to Europe so they could be better utilized. The parcel and logistics titan also heavily leaned on its road network to move shipments from those airports to the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and Kuwait. 

DHL made a similar pivot for container shipments managed by the Global Forwarding division. As ocean carriers diverted to ports in Oman and on Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea coast to offload import traffic, DHL secured extra trucking capacity to distribute goods around the Gulf region. 

Weak jet-fuel availability, especially in Asia, is a growing concern as the war cuts off tanker shipments to many parts of the world. DHL has to buy fuel in the commercial market at Asian airports, unlike in Europe where it has direct supply contracts with energy providers. DHL has the option to fuel up planes at origin destinations so there is enough fuel for the outbound leg, but that is only possible for regional and short-haul flights, Meyer explained. Tankering doesn’t work for intercontinental flights because it would reduce too much payload.

Established pricing and surcharge mechanisms will allow DHL to pass on conflict-related costs to customers as recovery charges kick in over time, the company said. 

Global Forwarding revenue declined 5% due to lower freight rates. Capacity shortages, including at Middle East airlines, and higher oil prices resulting from the conflict in the Middle East caused freight rates to rise again significantly at the end of the quarter.  Airfreight volumes increased 3.8% to 438,000 metric tons, driven primarily by the Asia-Europe trade lane and exports from Latin America. Air freight revenues decreased 2.2%.

Ocean freight demand moved up 2% year over year to 804,000 standard shipping units, with growth particularly strong from Asia to Europe. Ocean freight revenue and gross profit decreased by 16.5% and 17.5%, respectively, during the quarter, reflecting the normalization of market freight rates underway since 2025. 

Supply Chain revenue grew 5.7% thanks to new customers, contract renewals and continued expansion of e-commerce activities, led by the Americas region, DHL said. 

DHL eCommerce, which provides parcel delivery, returns and international shipping customized for online merchants, generated 11% less revenue than in the prior year period due to negative currency effects and not including UK contributions so the Evri merger in September doesn’t skew comparisons. Absent those factors, revenue increased by 4.9%. 

Group adjusted revenue, excluding currency impacts, has gradually improved over the past year and was up 2% year over year during the first quarter. The company reaffirmed full-year guidance of $7.25 billion of operating profit.

Meyer said U.S group revenue could grow the remainder of the year as the effects of frontloaded shipments to avoid U.S. tariffs in 2025 subside.

DHL Group’s capital expenditure during the quarter totaled $605.75 million, up 12.4% y/y, with most of the investments directed to the Supply Chain and Post & Parcel Germany divisions. An ongoing modernization program in the mail and parcel operations in Germanyhelped Deutsche Post handle a spike in mail and parcel shipments during the Easter and spring season. The capex growth stands in contrast to rival integrators FedEx and UPS, which are reducing investment in assets to reduce costs and increase profitability. DHL continues to invest as part of its 2030 growth strategy in efficiency and fast-growth sectors and regions, such as  life science & healthcare, data centers and the Middle East. By the end of 2025, for example, the share of electric vehicles used for pickup and delivery in Germany reached nearly 60%.

European trucking

Earlier this month, DHL Freight rolled out a more differentiated trucking product to give customers better choice. Road Freight Standard is the default option for less-than-truckload shipments and covers the majority of routine transport needs with DHL’s European freight network. Road Freight Priority is a premium product for time-critical international LTL shipments that combines prioritized handling, enhanced pick-up and delivery options and defined transit time commitments. Road Freight Direct provides customized partial truckload and full truckload point-to-point service for dedicated shipments. 

Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.

Write to Eric Kulisch at ekulisch@freightwaves.com.

RELATED STORIES:

How DHL tackled mail and parcel boom during peak Easter season

DHL prioritizes own cargo jets for pharmaceuticals transport 

The post DHL Group boosts profit despite lower shipment volumes, revenue appeared first on FreightWaves.

While global competitors in Europe and Asia are grappling with surging gas prices and heavy war-risk premiums, the United States is emerging as a structural winner in heavy manufacturing. 

The catalyst? The unique mechanics of “associated gas” – natural gas produced as a byproduct of oil drilling.

As elevated global crude oil (WTI) prices incentivize more domestic oil drilling, natural gas is flooding U.S. pipelines. With limited export relief valves, Henry Hub gas prices are actually dropping, giving American manufacturers a massive energy cost advantage over their global peers.

This industrial boom is already showing up in domestic freight market data. High-frequency SONAR indices confirm a sharp industrial mix shift favoring open-deck transport over consumer goods. 

Flatbed volumes (STVIF.USA) have skyrocketed 42% compared to their 6-month average, radically outpacing the 12% growth seen in dry van volumes (STVI.USA). This divergence is mirrored in pricing power: flatbed rates (FTI.USA) have surged 45% to an average of $3.97/mi, leaving van rate growth in the rearview mirror. 

The U.S. is rapidly capturing global market share in chemicals, fertilizers, plastics, metals and defense manufacturing – and flatbed carriers are reaping the immediate benefits. 

Want to understand how this geopolitical shift will reshape domestic supply chains and your routing guides? Read the full sitrep by signing up for SONAR or request a demo here.

The full report includes deeper dives into:

• The Associated Gas Feedback Loop: The physics and supply surge mechanics keeping U.S. energy costs suppressed while global benchmarks spike.
• Sector-by-Sector Cost Advantage Analysis: A breakdown of the specific manufacturing sectors positioned for the most explosive growth. 
• Shifting Manufacturing Postures: How the structural divergence in energy costs is permanently altering long-term industrial strategies.
• Actionable Freight Forecasting: Deeper analysis on the widening gap between flatbed and van metrics, and what it means for capacity planning in the coming quarters.

Sign up for SONAR today to access the full Freight Intelligence Report and keep your supply chain ahead of the curve.

The post SONAR Sitrep: US industrials, freight unexpected winners in Iran war appeared first on FreightWaves.

While there has been little diplomatic progress between Washington and Tehran toward ending the conflict, the ongoing blockade of the Strait of Hormuz by United States forces has been fueling (pun intended) higher ocean prices during a traditional lull prior to the start of the peak shipping season. 

Asia-U.S. West Coast spot rates increased 1% to $2,675 per forty foot equivalent unit (FEU), according to the Freightos Baltic Index. Asia-U.S. East Coast prices rose 3% to $3,939 per FEU.

The SONAR Ocean Booking Index shows a gradual climb from the start of the war Feb. 28, just after the conclusion of Lunar New Year, from 16,166 to 22,951. 

“Increased fuel costs from the Strait of Hormuz closure continues to keep container rates elevated during the post-Lunar New Year, pre-peak season, low demand season for ocean freight when prices normally reach their floor for the year,” said Freightos (NASDAQ: CRGO) Research Head Judah Levine, in a note to clients. “Even with this pressure, however, rates are well below spikes caused by recent disruptions like the Red Sea crisis and trade war frontloading.” 

That contrasts with Asia-Europe rates that eased 3% to both North Europe and the Mediterranean. While prices on both lanes climbed by several hundred dollars in the first weeks of the war, North Europe rates of $2,668 per FEU are just 8% higher than before the war and Mediterranean prices at $3,527 per FEU are 3% lower than in late February, Levine said. 

He noted that Maersk (OTC: AMKBY) recently cancelled an upcoming general rate increase (GRI) for Asia-Europe, and carriers have started to announce more blanked sailings, to manage capacity. 

“War-related rate increase attempts have not succeeded in keeping prices on these lanes much above their pre-war baselines,” said Levine, “but upward pressure from the conflict is likely keeping rates higher than they otherwise would be.”

Asia-Europe rates are more than 15% higher year-on-year for both lanes, and more than 50% above October levels, the most recent low-demand period. 

Slowly improving demand has helped carriers steadily push up rates on the trans-Pacific and prevent backsliding since late February. The current West Coast price is 45% higher than at the start of the war, and almost 90% higher than post-peak season levels back in October. East Coast prices are 30% higher than pre-war, and 30% better than October.

“Nonetheless, even with these increases, the low demand and high capacity environment – and possibly the moderate easing of oil and bunker rates compared to earlier highs since the start of the war in Iran  – has not allowed rates to rise to the full announced GRI or various surcharge levels,” he said. 

At the same time, the Persian Gulf crisis this week sent oil prices to new record highs as Brent crude increased to $121 a barrel for June contracts. The volatile market has in turn pushed up prices at U.S. pumps, to well over $5 a gallon for diesel.

Levine said that the next significant rate increases across these lanes could come in June or July with the start of peak season. But, he added, war-related rising costs for consumers could damp shipper expectations and depress peak season volumes. 

Read more articles by Stuart Chirls here.

Related coverage:

Uncertainty the new baseline, as the Port of Virginia plans to meet the moment

Trump extends Jones Act waiver for 90 days

The Iran conflict sent Asia-US shipping rates soaring thousands of miles away. Here’s why.

Why ‘grossly inefficient’ U.S. ports need automation, and the danger in a new Arctic sea route

The post Make it make sense: Low demand, rising rates on the trans-Pacific appeared first on FreightWaves.

Share gains in local accounts (SMBs), more customers using premium services and several AI-led efficiency initiatives are moving the needle for the Greenwich, Connecticut-based company. XPO is “hearing more positivity” from customers around capacity needs, which could propel operating ratios below 80%. 

XPO (NYSE: XPO) reported first-quarter adjusted earnings per share of $1.01, which was 13 cents ahead of the consensus estimate and 28 cents higher year over year. The adjusted EPS number excluded transaction and restructuring costs. A lower tax rate was roughly a 5-cent tailwind in the period.

Consolidated revenue of $2.1 billion was 7% higher y/y and better than the $2.04 billion consensus estimate.

XPO’s LTL revenue increased 5% y/y to $1.23 billion. Revenue was 6% higher on a per-day comparison. Tonnage came in flat y/y with revenue per hundredweight (yield) moving 5% higher. (Yield was up 4% y/y excluding fuel surcharges.) A 3% decline in weight per shipment and a 1% increase in length of haul were tailwinds to the yield metric.

Revenue per shipment (excluding fuel) increased 1% y/y, however, a mix shift to local accounts weighed on the calculation. These customers typically have smaller shipments sizes (lower revenue per bill), but pricing among the group is very accretive to margins. Further, management noted on a Thursday quarterly call that contract rate renewals were up by a mid- to high-single-digit percentage in the quarter.

The company is forecasting no y/y change to tonnage in the second quarter. April tonnage was down 1% y/y but tracked ahead of normal sequential patterns. Weight per shipment was up in the month and also ahead of normal seasonality.

Yield and revenue per shipment (excluding fuel) are expected to improve sequentially and y/y for the rest of the year. Management expects second-quarter yield to be “comfortably ahead” of the mid-single-digit increase seen in the first quarter. XPO’s improved service offering along with better freight selection are driving above-market pricing.

Something starting with a 7?

The LTL segment reported an 83.9% adjusted operating ratio (inverse of operating margin), which was 200 basis points better y/y and 50 bps better than the seasonally stronger fourth quarter. (The unit normally registers 50 bps of sequential margin deterioration in the first quarter.)

Revenue per shipment outpaced adjusted cost per shipment by 230 bps in the quarter. As a percentage of revenue, wages and benefits expenses declined 20 bps y/y, purchased transportation expenses moved 70 bps lower, and insurance and claims costs fell 60 bps.

Management noted a “clear line of sight” to an OR in the 70s.

It normally sees 250 to 300 bps of sequential margin improvement in the second quarter, but it expects “to comfortably outperform the high end of that range [80.9%]” this year. The outperformance would likely bring about a positive revision to its full-year margin outlook, which calls for only 100 to 150 bps of y/y improvement.

XPO’s European transportation segment reported an 11% y/y increase in revenue to $868 million. Adjusted EBITDA of $33 million was 3% higher y/y.

Shares of XPO were up 0.4% at 2:14 p.m. EDT on Thursday compared to the S&P 500, which was up 0.9%. The stock is up 57% year-to-date.

More FreightWaves articles by Todd Maiden:

• Saia eyes margin turnaround amid improving demand
• Old Dominion eyeing y/y margin improvement in Q2
• Landstar says April yields ‘significantly’ outpacing seasonality

The post XPO could soon see sub-80% ORs appeared first on FreightWaves.

The closures and layoffs are tied to the sale of RNDC key assets to Reyes Beverage Group, according to WARN filings and company documents.

Texas-based RNDC, a major wine and spirits distributor, said the moves could impact thousands of workers nationwide, as it exits multiple markets and transfers operations to Reyes, one of the largest beverage distributors in the country.

RNDC has issued conditional Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) notices affecting employees across multiple states, with total job cuts expected to reach as high as 4,677 positions, according to documents reviewed by FreightWaves.

Asset sale reshapes national footprint

The transaction spans at least seven markets, including Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Maryland, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia, significantly shrinking RNDC’s geographic footprint while expanding Reyes’ presence in wine and spirits distribution .

Company filings indicate that while some employees may receive job offers from Reyes, there is no guarantee of continued employment, prompting WARN notices across affected facilities.

In Texas alone, RNDC plans to cut 1,903 jobs across five cities, including:

• Grand Prairie: 689
• Houston: 588
• San Antonio: 372
• Austin: 164
• Corpus Christi: 90

In South Carolina, the company will permanently close its Lexington-area facility, affecting 451 employees.

Florida filings show potential layoffs across four major facilities, including Deerfield Beach, Jacksonville, Pensacola and Tampa, totaling more than 1,000 impacted workers.

In Virginia, RNDC plans to shut down its Ashland distribution facility, affecting 428 employees.

Data box: RNDC facility closures and layoffs

The post US alcohol distributor shutters major operations, cuts 4,600 jobs appeared first on FreightWaves.

Saia (NASDAQ: SAIA) reported first-quarter earnings per share of $1.86 on Thursday before the market opened. The result was flat year over year and 4 cents ahead of the consensus estimate. A lower tax rate was a 2-cent tailwind.

Revenue increased 2% y/y to $806 million, which was $18 million better than analysts’ expectations. Executives said on a quarterly call that customers are “getting more positive” and that many of its legacy service centers are again seeing growth given the optionality a national footprint provides.

Tonnage fell 2% y/y in the quarter as a 1% increase in shipments was offset by a 3% decline in weight per shipment. Revenue per hundredweight (yield) increased 4% (2% higher excluding fuel surcharges). The lower average shipment weight was a tailwind to the yield metric.

The first quarter contended with a tough prior-year tonnage comp (plus-12.8%). On a y/y comparison, tonnage fell by 7% in January and 2.7% in February. Tonnage was up 2.8% in March. Management said volume improvement in late-March helped offset some of the weather disruptions in January and February. Saia’s terminal network has a high concentration across the South, which was significantly impacted by the storms.

The March strength continued into April as tonnage increased 6.5% y/y. The prior-year comps eased in April (plus-4.4%) and turn negative in May. Weight per shipment improved throughout the quarter.

Contractual renewals averaged 6.7% in the quarter (up 12.8% on a two-year-stacked comp). Revenue per shipment (excluding fuel) was down 1% y/y, but improved sequentially through the quarter.

Q2 guide implies 87.5% OR

The company reported a 91.7% first-quarter operating ratio (inverse of operating margin), which was 60 basis points worse y/y and 40 bps worse than the adjusted fourth-quarter OR of 91.3% (excludes a one-time insurance item). The company previously said it hoped to outperform normal sequential OR deterioration of 30 to 50 bps.

The spread in cost per shipment and revenue per shipment was negative by 130 bps in the quarter. However, that was much smaller than the 560-bp negative spread booked in the fourth quarter.

Salaries, wages and benefits expenses (as a percentage of revenue) were 60 bps lower y/y even as health insurance costs and workers’ comp claims moved higher. Improved productivity (shipment touches down 2.5%) allowed for a 6.3% y/y reduction in headcount (7.9% lower excluding linehaul drivers). Salaries and wages costs moved 1.8% lower y/y due to the productivity improvements.

Depreciation and amortization expenses were 20 bps higher y/y given previous terminal and equipment additions. The company’s roughly 40 new facilities are operating at upper-90s ORs.

Saia normally sees 250 to 300 bps of sequential margin improvement in the second quarter. However, it’s calling for 400 to 450 bps of improvement this year (assuming normal seasonal demand trends). Firming volumes and a lower starting point are behind the outlook. The guide implies an 87.5% OR at the midpoint, which would be slightly better y/y.  

A full-year net capex range of $350 million to $400 million was reiterated. Net capex was $544 million in 2025 and $1.05 billion in 2024.

Shares of SAIA were up 5.7% at noon EDT on Thursday compared to the S&P 500, which was up 0.5%. The stock is up over 30% year-to-date.

More FreightWaves articles by Todd Maiden:

• Old Dominion eyeing y/y margin improvement in Q2
• Landstar says April yields ‘significantly’ outpacing seasonality
• ArcBest seeing positive trends amid market inflection

The post Saia eyes margin turnaround amid improving demand appeared first on FreightWaves.

REGISTER NOW: Secure your seat for the Future of Rail Symposium

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. – FreightWaves and TrainsPRO have announced the Future of Rail Symposium: The Decade Ahead, an exclusive one-day summit for rail industry executives, stakeholders, and regulators. The event will take place on July 28, 2026, at The Signal at the Chattanooga Choo Choo.

As the North American rail industry reaches a critical inflection point driven by reshoring trends and rapid technological advancement, the symposium serves as a high-level forum to discuss the strategy, policy, and execution required for rail networks to compete and win over the next decade.

Keynote and Featured Sessions

The program will be headlined by Surface Transportation Board Chairman Patrick Fuchs, who will deliver the opening keynote on the federal regulatory outlook for rail.

The agenda features deep-dive sessions tailored for industry professionals, including:

• Merger Insights: A look at how the proposed Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern transcontinental merger aims to break structural barriers to growth.
• Manufacturing Renaissance: CSX will discuss the railroad’s industrial development pipeline and the impact of reshoring in the Southeast and elsewhere on its system.
• Regulatory Friction: A panel featuring Ian Jefferies (AAR) and Karl Alexy (FRA) on how modern technology—from autonomous vehicles to track inspection—clashes with legacy regulations.
• The Operating Ratio Debate: Trains Magazine Editor Bill Stephens and analyst Rick Paterson will explore how Wall Street’s focus on the operating ratio limits Class I railroad service. Cando Rail & Terminals will explain how its first- and last-mile business model is one way to solve the carload growth problem.

Why Attend?

Designed specifically for C-suite leadership, government officials, and rail shippers, the symposium offers a unique “working forum” environment. Attendees will gain access to SONAR market intelligence regarding intermodal trends and witness rapid-fire demos of the latest rail technologies.

Event Logistics

Registration includes the full one-day symposium program, access to all keynote sessions, and a concluding Networking Happy Hour with speakers, sponsors, and rail executives.

Click here for more information and to view the full agenda.

The post STB chairman, industry leaders to headline Future of Rail Symposium appeared first on FreightWaves.

The Mountain View, Calif.-based company is now testing camera samples from Bosch. It has also completed early prototype integrations into its SensorPods. Those are the proprietary modules that house the company’s autonomous driving sensors. Kodiak is further evaluating vehicle actuation components from the supplier.

Hardware Work Accelerates

The partnership aims to create a production-ready autonomous platform. It will also support high-volume deployment of trucks running the Kodiak Driver. Two key factors needed for commercialization and scaling ambitions.

“The quick transition to tangible engineering progress underscores the velocity behind this collaboration,” said Don Burnette, founder and CEO of Kodiak AI. “By validating Bosch’s sensors and components, we are deep into the ‘how’ of high-volume production. Our rapid progress is proving we have the shared ability to execute on the roadmap to industrialize the Kodiak Driver at scale.”

Bosch ranks as the world’s largest automotive supplier. It brings a broad portfolio that includes automotive-grade sensors and other components. Such partnerships are critical for self-driving truck companies that need reliable hardware at commercial scale.

“Our progress highlights our readiness to move from strategic alignment to industrial execution as we work to bring scaled autonomous trucking to fruition,” said Peter Tadros, regional president of Power Solutions at Bosch North America. “This cooperation has accelerated and deepened our understanding of real-world autonomous vehicle requirements and helped us forge a path for scaling redundant autonomous driving technology for the entire ecosystem.”

Kodiak’s SensorPods now feature prototype sensor integrations developed with Bosch components. The platform combines specialized hardware, firmware and software interfaces needed to run the Kodiak Driver on trucks. The system can be installed on the assembly line or through an upfitter.

Public Markets and Permian Operations

Kodiak went public in September through a merger with special-purpose acquisition company Ares Acquisition Corp. II. The combined company was valued at about $2.5 billion. Kodiak currently operates a fleet of autonomous trucks in the Permian Basin under an agreement with Atlas Energy Solutions.

Kodiak’s SensorPod technology with Bosch hardware samples will be on display May 3-6 at the ACT Expo in Las Vegas.

The post Kodiak AI and Bosch begin hardware deliveries for autonomous trucks appeared first on FreightWaves.