Shipping Trends for October 2024: Latest Freight Market Cheat Sheet

Welcome to the Freight Market Cheat Sheet.

In this short guide, supply chain professionals (like you) can get a quick update on what’s happening in North American freight markets this month.

Get insights driven by market experts and proprietary network data.

Freight Market Overview

Summer shipping is over and peak season prep has begun.

We may be in a new truckload market cycle (according to our Coyote Curve forecast), but we’ve yet to see a huge upswing in freight market activity.

Let’s look at a few trends before diving into rates and modes.

Hurricanes Helene & Milton had limited impact to freight markets

In late September and early October, two hurricanes battered the southeastern U.S.

For Helene, we saw a disruption and subsequent spot rate spikes throughout impacted regions (FL, GA, NC, VA, MD) as shippers, receivers and carriers deal with the aftermath of the damage.

Milton largely impacted central Florida, which, relatively speaking, doesn’t have a tremendous amount of outbound freight shipping this time of year.

Despite the catastrophic damage from the storms, the impact to supply chains has been mostly regional and hasn’t spilled over into broader market trends. The significant property and infrastructure damage will drive disaster relief freight, but early signs point to a muted impact on supply chain as a whole.

In previous market cycles, major storms can act as a catalyst to overall market tightening. This time around, that seems to not be the case.

A port strike came and went

After going on strike, dock workers in Gulf Coast and Eastern U.S. ports agreed to a tentative deal after three days. An extended strike could have led to widespread disruptions, but given its short duration, it was a blip on the radar as it relates to freight markets.

There’s still a chance the union could veto the agreement, or the deal could otherwise fall apart, but for the time being, it appears disruption has been avoided.

Peak season is around the corner

October is typically a relative lull before retail peak season heats up in November. Even if there is a decent spike in demand, freight markets are well positioned to absorb it — capacity is abundant and spot rates steady.

As the spot market activity ramps up closer to the holidays, and some shippers begin Q4 rate resets (which many are still pushing for Y/Y decreases), the gap between spot and contract rates will likely narrow, potentially creating some market tightening.

Full Truckload Trends: October 2024

In September, we saw overall truckload rates remain flat month-over-month (M/M).

Looking at equipment types, dry van (-0.4%) went down a notch, refrigerated moved up 0.7%, and open deck moved up 3.4%. In short, hardly any movement from August.

Looking at year-over-year (Y/Y) comparisons, however, we continued our venture into inflationary territory in total (9.0%), dry van (9.6%), reefer (5.6), and flatbed (15.1%).

Note on the data: all truckload rate figures are derived from Coyote’s proprietary transactional data. With thousands of daily shipments, it is one of the largest centralized freight marketplaces in North America.

LTL Trends: October 2024

Recent merger & acquisition activity in the LTL market

Knight-Swift
Knight-Swift, traditionally a truckload-focused carrier, continues to build out their national LTL footprint. This started with AAA Cooper, who was primarily a Southeast carrier, followed by Midwest Motor Express. Most recently, Knight-Swift acquired Dependable Highway Express, giving them California, Arizona, and Nevada coverage. The companies will operate as two entities for the present, but are targeting October to merge into the same Standard Carrier Alpha Code (SCAC).

Furthermore, Knight-Swift has been opening terminals acquired in the Yellow bankruptcy to further expand their coverage. To complete their national coverage, they need to acquire a Northeast-focused carrier.

Frontline Freight
Frontline Freight has finished rebranding to STG Logistics, who acquired them last year. In addition to the rebrand, they are doing an overhaul of their transit times to more accurately represent the consolidation model (their linehauls primarily move on the rail via intermodal).

DC Logistics
DC Logistics has purchased GLS US Freight. The company will rebrand as Mountain Valley Express, serving as a west coast regional LTL provider.

Changes coming to NMFC classifications in 2025

The NMFTA is in the process of making changes to the NMFC classification system. Changes will not go into effect until May of next year, but it is going to impact many shippers.

As of now, there are over 5,000 NMFC item numbers projected to change to a density-based scale, ranging from class 50 to 400.

Here’s a timeline of the changes:

January 2025: Docket 2025-1, a list of NMFC items that are potentially going to change, will be available for review. The NMFTA has provided a preliminary list already, but it is subject to change pending feedback and meetings.
March 2025: The NMFTA will hold a public meeting to discuss the changes.
May 2025: NMFC changes will go into effect.

To stay updated, visit the 2025 NMFC Changes page on the NMFTA site.

Intermodal Trends: October 2024

Trends from the JOC Conference

We attended the JOC Inland Distribution conference in Chicago from 9/30 to 10/2, and two themes stood out across several panels:

Where are rates are going in 2025?
What can I do to reduce risk of cargo theft?

Intermodal pricing is at a crossroads. Truckload rates have been stable and shippers will not likely have much tolerance for general rate increases. Meanwhile, many railroads are indicating a potential for Y/Y rate increases anywhere in the low-to-high single-digit percentages, depending on the corridor.

Currently, intermodal contract rates are saving shippers ~25% versus truckload, while spot rates about 20% cheaper than truck on lanes where intermodal service is available. It remains to be seen which side gives, but it’s likely that many shippers and intermodal providers will meet somewhere in the middle.

On fraud and theft prevention, intermodal has some unique advantages — drayage carriers participates in and are governed by the UIIA Interchange Agreement, and UIIA partner carriers must also register and maintain their drivers in the Intermodal Driver Database in order for their drivers to enter secure intermodal facilities. This helps to improve driver and carrier vetting.

Regarding physical security, more shippers are using theft-deterrent seals, which are growing more affordable and provide an additional level of security when the train is passing near population centers.

Southern California updates

The recently-ended ILA strike had virtually no impact on intermodal rates and operations. Entering October, the only real area of intermodal capacity tightness is Los Angeles.

The Ports of L.A. and Long Beach have recently seen record levels of import traffic, and most intermodal linehaul carriers have implemented surcharges.

At present, a number of global factors have contributed to an increased demand for intermodal transportation out of Los Angeles. As a result, we’ve seen an increase is intermodal rates out of Los Angeles.

All of the following factors have contributed in some way to increased port activity on the U.S. West coast (specifically Los Angeles):

Relatively low water levels in the Panama Canal have increased traffic East Asian imports through Los Angeles instead of U.S. East coast ports
Yemen-based Houthi strikes against ships entering the Red Sea have caused some South Asian manufacturers in India & Pakistan to ship their freight to the U.S. West coast instead
The USMX / ILA contract uncertainty on the East coast caused some customers and shipping lines to divert traffic to the West coast
The recent railroad labor unrest in Canada motivated some customers to divert traffic away from Vancouver

Cross-Border Mexico Trends: October 2024

After rates remained flat in August, they resumed their climb upwards, going up 2.8% in September. Northbound rates increased 3.6% M/M, and southbound rates increased 4.9%.

Cross-Border Canada Trends: October 2024

In August, truckload rates climbed 5.6% M/M in Canada.

This was due to disruptions caused by the railroad labor disputes. In the weeks leading up to the strike date of August 22^nd, many shippers proactively shifted urgent rail shipments to truck, putting a major strain on capacity throughout the country. Trucking companies faced challenges in meeting the quickly increased demand, leading to increased shipping costs and longer delivery times.

However, the strike ended after just a few days (due to Canadian government intervention), and though the effect on supply chains was meaningful, the market largely stabilized by mid-month.

In September, overall rates were down -6.6%, with northbound decreasing -4.9% and southbound increasing 7.3%.

Winter is coming

When you think of Canada, cold weather is probably one of the first things that comes to mind. Protect-from-freeze season will be starting with shippers over the next several weeks, so expect demand for reefer capacity to increase.

If you haven’t done so already, establish a plan for how you’ll keep your freight safe an secure the capacity you need.

Coyote News

Stay up-to-date with Coyote Logistics.

UPS, Coyote’s parent company, announced the sale of Coyote to RXO

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