Topic: Rates and Pricing

November’s TVI dry van freight reading—at 197—fell 18% compared to October, while falling 12% annually. The November refrigerated (reefer) TVI—at 172—was down 11% sequentially and off 6.0% annually. And the flatbed TVI—at 243—was down 22% sequentially and posted a 3% annual gain.   

For October, the most recent month for which data is available, the SCI reading rose to 0.3, after September’s -0.5.

Top trucking industry executives are hoping 2026 will—finally—be the year when pent-up demand translates into higher freight rates and a return to profitability in both the truckload and less-than-truckload (LTL) sectors.

For October, the most recent month for which data is available, the TCI reading came in at 0.89, marking a slight improvement over September’s 0.42 reading.

Uncertainty still dominates the transportation landscape, but shifts in capacity, trade policy, energy markets, and global demand suggest a year of transition. Our panel reveals where rates may finally stabilize—and where volatility is far from over. In this annual webcast, supply chain group editorial director Michael Levans and contributing editor Brooks Bentz have assembled our annual panel of logistics and freight transportation analysts to share their insights on rate patterns in all the major transport modes in an effort...

the Federal Reserve announced it has lowered the target rate, for the federal funds rate, which comes from its Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) for the third consecutive month, dropping it by 0.25%, to 3.5%-to-3.75%, its lowest rate level since 2022.

For October, the most recent month for which data is available, U.S. imports, for the ports surveyed in the report, came in at 2.07 million Twenty-Foot Equivalent Units (TEU), excluding the Port of Charleston, which marked a 1.8% sequential decline and a 7.9% annual decline.  

With a 9.3-cent decline, the national average came in at $3.665 per gallon, following a 7.3-cent decline, to $3.758, for the week of December 1, and a 3.7-cent decline, to $3.831, for the week of November 24, for a cumulative 20.3-cent decline over that span.

With the existing contract between global e-commerce retailer Amazon and the United States Postal Service set to expire in October 2026, media reports published yesterday indicated that there could be some shifts coming in that relationship.

ODFL reported that November revenue per day fell 4.4% annually, related to a 10.0% decrease in LTL tons per day, which it said was partially offset by an increase in LTL revenue per hundredweight.

The November Services PMI, at 52.6 (a reading above 50 represents expansion and below 50 indicates contraction), rose 0.2% over October’s 52.4, with September flat, at 50.0, growing, at a faster rate, for the second consecutive month. Which was preceded by expansion in 13 of the previous 14 months before September.  

In a speech at last week’s RailTrends conference in New York, Union Pacific Railroad CEO Jim Vena made the case for Union Pacific’s historic proposed $85 billion merger with Norfolk Southern, in advance of the company submitting its merger application to the Surface Transportation Board.

With a 3.1-cent gain, the national average came in at $3.868, for the week of November 17.

In a wide-ranging presentation at the RailTrends conference in New York last week, Adriene Bailey, partner and head of the North American Rail Team at Oliver Wyman, offered up detailed insight and analysis on various topics impacting the North American freight railroad market.

Logistics Management Group News Editor Jeff Berman recently interviewed Ali Faghri Chief Strategy Officer at Greenwich, Conn.-based national less-than-truckload (LTL) carrier XPO. Faghri provided Berman with a detailed overview of the LTL market, economic conditions, and how XPO is leveraging AI, among other topics, in the interview below.

October spot truckload volumes and rates were largely mixed again, according to the new edition of the DAT Truckload Volume Index, which was recently released by DAT Freight and Analytics.

First quarter revenue growth expectations were described as steady in the report, with an average forecast of 2%, while positive revenue sentiment hit 72%, its highest level since the second quarter 2025, following a 69% projection, for the fourth quarter, in the report’s previous edition.

The October shipments reading, at 0.997, was down 7.8% annually, and the October expenditures reading, at 3.169, decreased 0.2% annually.

Rising 8.4 cents, the national average, for the week of November 10, came in at $3.837, following a 3.5-cent increase, to $3.753, for the week of November 3, and a 9.9-cent increase, to $3.718, for the week of October 27, with the national average rising a collective 21.8 cents over that period.   

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.