Topic: Blogs

With one year ending and a new one soon beginning, there is often a sense of a change or a fresh start coming. While that may sound good on paper, when it comes to the current state of the freight, or logistics, economy, it is more than likely that that prospects of meaningful shifts, or changes, in the current landscape, may not represent anything more than wishful thinking.

For 2025, NRF said it is calling for total holiday season spending to come increase between 3.7%-to-4.2% annually, coming in between $1.01 trillion-to-$1.02 trillion. In 2024, holiday sales saw a 4.3% annual gain, to $976.1 billion.

Given the myriad of challenges facing the LTL market, it is likely that current market conditions are likely to remain intact, barring a true indication of a demand catalyst.

With the federal government shutdown now into its third week—and no clear indication of how long it could last—its impact on supply chains appears to somewhat still be coming into focus, noted various industry observers.

The firm said that based on its estimates it expects that 2.3 million packages will be delivered over this year’s peak, representing a 5% annual gain, attributing the expected increase to one more shopping day than there was in 2024.

The White House issued an executive order earlier this month, which it said it takes steps to modify tariff policies and also establish procedures to implement trade and security agreements with foreign partners, in regards to what it called persistent U.S. goods trade benefits that are considered a national security threat.

It is hard to find a period in time in which supply chains have seen so much volatility and uncertainty, in various ways as over the last five years. That is nothing new, to be sure, but, at the same time, it does speak to the significance of the industry (whether you may be a shipper, carrier, 3PL, academic, analyst, lobbyist, or anything else along those lines).

A common refrain among industry stakeholders has been that they know tariffs are coming, or have already arrived, but they badly want, and need, some clarity and stability on tariff rates in order to effectively take action, as it relates to a whole host of things, including: operations; sourcing and procurement; inventory management; capital expenditures; and hiring and staffing, among many others.

While leadership at Class I railroad carriers Union Pacific (UP) and Norfolk Southern (NS) touted the benefits of this week’s announcement, coming to terms on an $85 billion deal in which UP will acquire NS—to create the nation’s  first transcontinental railroad that will connect more than 50,000 route miles across 43 states from the East Coast to the West Coast and connect around 100 ports as well—feedback from various shipper groups has been less than receptive to the deal.

While the outcome of the federal budget reconciliation bill, also known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB),” was largely expected to be passed along party lines, as was the case last month, what is less definitive about the bill is its potential impact on freight transportation and logistics operations.

While it is likely true that not many people thought the soon-to-be-ending three-month pause on the White House’s “Liberation Day, ” or reciprocal, tariffs would be a low-key affair, with just more than a week to go to the July 8 deadline, the global supply chain, once again, is preparing—and very likely about to deal with more—for a hefty amount of uncertainty, coupled with what could be viewed as a continued lack of clarity, relating to next step in...

The Economic Outlook issued earlier this month by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) stated that “global economic prospects are weakening with substantial barriers to trade, tighter financial conditions, diminishing confidence, and heightened policy uncertainty projected to have adverse impacts with growth.

The May LMI reading, at 59.4, marked a 0.6% increase over April’s 55.8, while posting a 5.8% annual gain, as well as a 12.3% increase over May 2023’s 47.3. The impact of the aforementioned increased costs was evident in the report, as its authors explained inventory movements “slowed significantly compared to observations from earlier in the year.

The de minimis exemption, which allowed shipments under $800 sent from China and Hong Kong to the U.S. to not be subject to tariffs, and officially came to an end on May 2. With this change now in effect, it requires all shipments from these regions—regardless of value—to undergo full customs processing and be subject to applicable tariffs, as noted in various reports.

Executives from San Diego-based parcel consultancy Shipware offered up some observations on this development, with Amazon and FedEx renewing business ties, following a June 2019 breakup, in which FedEx announced it made a “strategic decision” not to renew the FedEx Express U.S. contract with Amazon, as it focused on serving the broader e-commerce market.

The Federal Reserve announced it again decided to maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 4.25%-to-4.5%.

With the 90-day pause on reciprocal tariffs placed on U.S. trading partners now in place, save for a 10% baseline tariff and also the furry of tariffs placed on China throughout the last week, there is a question of “what now?” in logistics circles, to say the least.

Paul Bingham, S&P Global Market Intelligence Economist, explained that these new tariffs are not surprising, given what was expected—except that some of the individual country levels are higher than initially estimated.

With President Trump set to roll out what are being described as widespread tariffs on United States trading partners later today, findings from a study published this week by the National Retail Federation and Morning Consult highlight ongoing concerns regarding tariffs and the potential subsequent economic impacts.

As United States-driven tariff-related actions continue to dominate the narrative in supply chain and freight transportation circles, leading to a new “Trade War,” it is not an understatement to say it has brought with it a sense of economic uncertainty, and unease regarding macroeconomic conditions.