The TL market continues to be surprisingly strong with no sign of slowing. From being completely dead in April, spot rates are now up over 30% from their lows this spring and are now averaging over $2.00. This is the highest they have been since December, 2018.
Additionally, ocean container freight rates from East Asia to the US are at their highest levels in nearly 2 years, although we have seen these rates level off in the past month. Still the rates are about 100% higher than they were just 4 months ago.
On the positive side, oil remains around $40 / barrel, which is keeping the national diesel average at around $2.40 / gallon.
About the Author
Mike Mulqueen is the Executive Principal of Strategy & Innovation at JBF Consulting. Mike is a leading expert in logistics solutions with over 30 years managing, designing and implementing freight transport technology. His functional expertise is in Multi-modal Transportation Management, Supply Chain Visibility, and Transportation Modeling. Mike earned his master’s degree in engineering and logistics from MIT and BS in business and marketing from University of Maryland.
About JBF Consulting
Since 2003, we’ve been helping shippers of all sizes and across many industries select, implement and squeeze as much value as possible out of their logistics systems. We speak your language — not consultant-speak – and we get to know you. Our leadership team has over 100 years of logistics and TMS implementation experience. Because we operate in a niche — we’re not all things to all people — our team members have a very specialized skill set: logistics operations experience + transportation technology + communication and problem-solving skills + a bunch of other cool stuff.