COLUMBUS, Ind. — The latest release of ACT’s For-Hire Trucking Index showed the supply-demand balance rising to 55.6 on a seasonally adjusted basis in October from 50.1 in September. The strong increase in the Volume Index and the downtick in the Capacity Index both pressed the balance higher, now showing some tightness returning to the trucking industry. This follows an essentially balanced market in September.
“We saw good sequential improvement in October freight volume and truck utilization, which we expect to continue through the holiday season,” said Tim Denoyer, ACT Research’s vice president and senior analyst. “But, we’ll have to be careful of the effects of pre-tariff shipping for the next several months. This corresponds to the 18 percent year-over-year increase in container imports at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in October, so it’s fair to say the pre-ship is helping, and will likely reverse to temporarily loosen supply-demand in early 2019.”
The October fleet purchase intentions reading indicated an uptick in equipment demand, with 57.2 percent of respondents planning to buy trucks in the next three months, up from 55.5 percent in September.
“After record year-to-date orders, this series should remain elevated as long lead-time truck orders are built and hit the highways,.” Denoyer said.
As part of this month’s survey, ACT Research queried fleets about what future questions they would like to see asked of the industry.
“Most of the questions that survey responders would have us ask in the future center around drivers, from recruiting strategies and sign-on bonuses to identification of the main reasons truck drivers leave their companies,” Denover said. “Other concerns of fleets in ACT’s For-Hire Trucking Index survey included contract pricing and bidding, technology and collision mitigation, and regulation impacts.”
ACT is a publisher of new and used commercial vehicle industry data, market analysis and forecasting services for the North American market, as well as the U.S. tractor-trailer market and the China CV market.
For more information on ACT, please visit http://www.actresearch.net.
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