Capacity tightens into the holidays, but how long will it last?

Dec 02, 2019 at 08:22 AM CST
Available trucking capacity has meaningfully tightened over the past few weeks as a combination of rising retail volumes, bad weather and truck drivers heading home for the Thanksgiving holiday and shifting the balance of freight markets. The question on freight brokers minds is how long will it last. After a strong late summer and early fall when national contracted truckload volumes (OTVI.USA) were as much as 6% above year-ago levels, freight demand slipped in the back half of October. Volumes went negative on a year-over-year basis (OTVIY.USA) in the first week of November.

Dec 02, 2019 at 08:22 AM CST

Available trucking capacity has meaningfully tightened over the past few weeks as a combination of rising retail volumes, bad weather and truck drivers heading home for the Thanksgiving holiday and shifting the balance of freight markets. The question on freight brokers minds is how long will it last. After a strong late summer and early fall when national contracted truckload volumes (OTVI.USA) were as much as 6% above year-ago levels, freight demand slipped in the back half of October. Volumes went negative on a year-over-year basis (OTVIY.USA) in the first week of November.