Fourth-Quarter Trucking Outlook: Analyzing the Peak Season
US truck shippers are enjoying the feast stage of a feast-and-famine cycle, as last year’s tightest trucking market on record gives way to an all-time capacity glut this year. As the fall shipping season approaches, spot dry van truckload rates are down by double-digit percentages from this time last year, and contract rates are nearly flat year over year. Where rates are rising — in the less-than-truckload market, for example — they’re climbing much more slowly than last year. Shippers say LTL carriers that initially seek high single-digit percentage rate hikes in annual contracts often settle for much lower increases. There’s debate over how long this shipper’s market will last, however, with some optimistic trucking executives expecting a rebound in the second half of 2019. Others don’t expect much change until 2020. This webcast will discuss what trucking shippers, motor carriers, and others can expect in the truckload, LTL, and other sectors as 2019 enters the home stretch. Along the way, it will address the following questions:
- With debate raging about whether the US economy faces a recession, what should trucking interests expect in terms of industrial, consumer, and freight demand?
- How deeply and how long will shippers and other trucking stakeholders feel the impact of the US-China trade war?
- Will reliable low-sulfur blends be available quickly, or will carriers have to count on more-expensive marine gas-oil to get them through the first few months of 2020?
- What is the current state and outlook for inventory levels in the US?