Monthly indexes of freight shipments and spending turned positive on a year-over-year basis in January, prompting the index's author to declare an end to the nearly two-year freight recession.
The overall index, published late Friday by audit and payment firm Cass Information Systems, Inc., reported that shipments grew 3.2 percent year-over-year, while expenditures—the total amount spent on freight—rose 4.3 percent. The shipment index first turned positive in October, breaking a 20-month streak of year-over-year negative comparisons and providing the first sign of a freight recovery. The positive year-over-year reading in the expenditures index is the first in 22 months, according to the Cass data, which is based on its auditing and payment of about $20 billion in freight bills annually.
The expenditures index had a low bar to climb relative to the January 2016 reading, which was the worst in five years. The 2016 data reflected weakening demand and a decline in fuel surcharges paid by shippers due to low fuel prices at the time. Oil prices have risen substantially since then, leading to an upward bias in last month's expenditures reading. Cass includes fuel surcharges in its calculations of the expenditures index.
Year-over-year volume growth is being fueled by growing demand for parcel services, due to the continuing surge in e-commerce transactions that normally move via parcel. Solid volume growth on trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific airfreight volumes are also a factor, according to the report, which is prepared, along with the Cass data, by Donald Broughton, managing director, chief market strategist and senior transportation analyst at Avondale Partners, an investment firm.
Even rail carloadings, which have been impacted by a secular decline in demand for coal and a general economic malaise, came off as being "increasingly less bad," according to Broughton. Both commodity carloads and intermodal demand have turned up in recent months, according to the report, citing data from the trade group Association of American Railroads (AAR).
Rail volumes have been aided by an increase in oil and gas fracking activity spurred by rising oil prices, according to the report. The U.S. freight recession that Broughton said began in March 2015 was triggered by the collapse in oil prices that led to a near-total shutdown of domestic fracking operations and investment.
Demand data for trucking services has been uninspiring, Broughton said. However, he noted that he is seeing increased evidence of carriers' pricing power.
Broughton repeated his long-held concern that the freight flow data does not justify an interest rate hike from the Federal Reserve at this time. A rate increase, which is widely expected next month at the next meeting of the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), will hurt freight activity by continuing to drive up the dollar's value, curtailing U.S. exports and slowing domestic production, Broughton said. In December 2015, the Fed raised its benchmark federal funds rate by 25 basis points, its first increase in a decade. The central bank followed that with another 25 basis points move last December.
Broughton acknowledged that the current national unemployment rate has fallen to the point where it historically generated labor cost inflation. However, the combination of a secular decline in the nation's labor participation rate and a dramatic slowing in productivity gains means labor cost inflation is not the threat that it once was, he said.
Supply chain planning (SCP) leaders working on transformation efforts are focused on two major high-impact technology trends, including composite AI and supply chain data governance, according to a study from Gartner, Inc.
"SCP leaders are in the process of developing transformation roadmaps that will prioritize delivering on advanced decision intelligence and automated decision making," Eva Dawkins, Director Analyst in Gartner’s Supply Chain practice, said in a release. "Composite AI, which is the combined application of different AI techniques to improve learning efficiency, will drive the optimization and automation of many planning activities at scale, while supply chain data governance is the foundational key for digital transformation.”
Their pursuit of those roadmaps is often complicated by frequent disruptions and the rapid pace of technological innovation. But Gartner says those leaders can accelerate the realized value of technology investments by facilitating a shift from IT-led to business-led digital leadership, with SCP leaders taking ownership of multidisciplinary teams to advance business operations, channels and products.
“A sound data governance strategy supports advanced technologies, such as composite AI, while also facilitating collaboration throughout the supply chain technology ecosystem,” said Dawkins. “Without attention to data governance, SCP leaders will likely struggle to achieve their expected ROI on key technology investments.”
The British logistics robot vendor Dexory this week said it has raised $80 million in venture funding to support an expansion of its artificial intelligence (AI) powered features, grow its global team, and accelerate the deployment of its autonomous robots.
A “significant focus” continues to be on expanding across the U.S. market, where Dexory is live with customers in seven states and last month opened a U.S. headquarters in Nashville. The Series B will also enhance development and production facilities at its UK headquarters, the firm said.
The “series B” funding round was led by DTCP, with participation from Latitude Ventures, Wave-X and Bootstrap Europe, along with existing investors Atomico, Lakestar, Capnamic, and several angels from the logistics industry. With the close of the round, Dexory has now raised $120 million over the past three years.
Dexory says its product, DexoryView, provides real-time visibility across warehouses of any size through its autonomous mobile robots and AI. The rolling bots use sensor and image data and continuous data collection to perform rapid warehouse scans and create digital twins of warehouse spaces, allowing for optimized performance and future scenario simulations.
Originally announced in September, the move will allow Deutsche Bahn to “fully focus on restructuring the rail infrastructure in Germany and providing climate-friendly passenger and freight transport operations in Germany and Europe,” Werner Gatzer, Chairman of the DB Supervisory Board, said in a release.
For its purchase price, DSV gains an organization with around 72,700 employees at over 1,850 locations. The new owner says it plans to investment around one billion euros in coming years to promote additional growth in German operations. Together, DSV and Schenker will have a combined workforce of approximately 147,000 employees in more than 90 countries, earning pro forma revenue of approximately $43.3 billion (based on 2023 numbers), DSV said.
After removing that unit, Deutsche Bahn retains its core business called the “Systemverbund Bahn,” which includes passenger transport activities in Germany, rail freight activities, operational service units, and railroad infrastructure companies. The DB Group, headquartered in Berlin, employs around 340,000 people.
“We have set clear goals to structurally modernize Deutsche Bahn in the areas of infrastructure, operations and profitability and focus on the core business. The proceeds from the sale will significantly reduce DB’s debt and thus make an important contribution to the financial stability of the DB Group. At the same time, DB Schenker will gain a strong strategic owner in DSV,” Deutsche Bahn CEO Richard Lutz said in a release.
Transportation industry veteran Anne Reinke will become president & CEO of trade group the Intermodal Association of North America (IANA) at the end of the year, stepping into the position from her previous post leading third party logistics (3PL) trade group the Transportation Intermediaries Association (TIA), both organizations said today.
Meanwhile, TIA today announced that insider Christopher Burroughs would fill Reinke’s shoes as president & CEO. Burroughs has been with TIA for 13 years, most recently as its vice president of Government Affairs for the past six years, during which time he oversaw all legislative and regulatory efforts before Congress and the federal agencies.
Before her four years leading TIA, Reinke spent two years as Deputy Assistant Secretary with the U.S. Department of Transportation and 16 years with CSX Corporation.
Serious inland flooding and widespread power outages are likely to sweep across Florida and other Southeast states in coming days with the arrival of Hurricane Helene, which is now predicted to make landfall Thursday evening along Florida’s northwest coast as a major hurricane, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
While the most catastrophic landfall impact is expected in the sparsely-population Big Bend area of Florida, it’s not only sea-front cities that are at risk. Since Helene is an “unusually large storm,” its flooding, rainfall, and high winds won’t be limited only to the Gulf Coast, but are expected to travel hundreds of miles inland, the weather service said. Heavy rainfall is expected to begin in the region even before the storm comes ashore, and the wet conditions will continue to move northward into the southern Appalachians region through Friday, dumping storm total rainfall amounts of up to 18 inches. Specifically, the major flood risk includes the urban areas around Tallahassee, metro Atlanta, and western North Carolina.
In addition to its human toll, the storm could exert serious business impacts, according to the supply chain mapping and monitoring firm Resilinc. Those will be largely triggered by significant flooding, which could halt oil operations, force mandatory evacuations, restrict ports, and disrupt air traffic.
While the storm’s track is currently forecast to miss the critical ports of Miami and New Orleans, it could still hurt operations throughout the Southeast agricultural belt, which produces products like soybeans, cotton, peanuts, corn, and tobacco, according to Everstream Analytics.
That widespread footprint could also hinder supply chain and logistics flows along stretches of interstate highways I-10 and I-75 and on regional rail lines operated by Norfolk Southern and CSX. And Hurricane Helene could also likely impact business operations by unleashing power outages, deep flooding, and wind damage in northern Florida portions of Georgia, Everstream Analytics said.
Before the storm had even touched Florida soil, recovery efforts were already being launched by humanitarian aid group the American Logistics Aid Network (ALAN). In a statement on Wednesday, the group said it is urging residents in the storm's path across the Southeast to heed evacuation notices and safety advisories, and reminding members of the logistics community that their post-storm help could be needed soon. The group will continue to update its Disaster Micro-Site with Hurricane Helene resources and with requests for donated logistics assistance, most of which will start arriving within 24 to 72 hours after the storm’s initial landfall, ALAN said.