FreightWaves CEO：货运衰退已结束，运价上涨对通胀影响有限

Craig, I wanna have a broader discussion with you. But first, any developments around the Strait Of Hormuz? Have we reached the cap beyond which, you know, hiring a ship just isn't doable because there is no firm war for the price to go? No. I mean, ultimately, the, logistics market is responding to this, higher prices for containers, higher prices for shipping. But that's the great thing about logistics companies is they respond to these events.

They price it accordingly, and, we're seeing freight rerouted, to account for this disruption, which is just one of many, many disruptions that we've had over the last, you know, inevitably over the last decade. What about insurance costs? Do they continue to rise? Do we have any kind of fall off in insurance costs even when we got the memorandum of understanding? Well, I think, ultimately, a lot of the cost, the insurance cost is is priced into the current conditions.

While there are some attacks on civilian vessels, I think largely the sort of kinetic conflict is we'll call it simmering a little bit, but not explosive. And so, ultimately, insurance companies and ship owners have have understand the risks, and that is priced into the market currently. Craig, I want your thoughts as well on this new Arctic route that's being reported on today. So, apparently, a China shipping company is going through the Arctic because polar ice caps melting allow it to traverse from Asia to Europe in twenty days as opposed to the regular forty days it takes generally.

Is this a route that could take off and help other shipping companies avoid these dangerous choke points? Yeah. I mean, this has been something that's been talked about for at least the last decade, the fact that the polar ice caps are melting, which will provide new sea lanes. Russia has has some some break some icebreakers to be able to clear the lanes. This is one of the reasons that Donald Trump has wanted Greenland is because, ultimately, if you're coming across the Arctic, you're gonna pass Greenland, and it provides a much from a strategic standpoint, provides a a really interesting sort of outcome.

But this is really a continuation. It's something that shouldn't be a surprise to anybody because it's something we've been watching and monitoring for the past at least decade. And it's it's certainly the dream of the Chinese, the dream of the Russians to get access to the North Atlantic because and the Arctic Ocean because, ultimately, this provides, you know, avoids the bottleneck that is in the Middle East, and allows them to route more direct traffic to North America.

Craig, just more broadly, port volumes are surging. Ocean carrier rates obviously have gone through the roof, they're passing on those costs. Energy surcharges have been very, very widespread and are getting more widespread. Truck manufacturing is tightening. All of this is a negative for the consumer and for those that are importing, but it's great news for the freight industry. Right? Is is the freight recession definitively a thing of the past?

Oh, the freight recession's been over since November. And, everybody's celebrating because it's been a miserable existence. Ocean container lines, they were out of a recession pretty quickly. They had a, you know, been eight month recession, but trucking has been in a was in a recession really since 2022, and it ended in November of this past year of '25. And so everyone feels relief. I would I would dispute your comment about it bad for the consumer because, ultimately, when freight's moving, that is good for consumers.

I mean, transportation cost is about 3% of finished goods prices that consumers pay. So even if we see a doubling of freight rates, it's still a marginal impact for consumers in terms of inflation. So, ultimately, things are moving. The industry is feeling incredibly bullish, and we're seeing volumes pick up on the international container market as well as in domestic trucking and rail. It's up into the right for the freight industry, and I think that tells us a lot about consumer activity.

But more importantly, it tells us a lot about industrial activity. Well, just on that point, everything I just mentioned, I do they only add up to incremental costs for the consumer? Is this not a significant inflation push at all then? It's not a huge, impact to inflation. There ultimately, retailers absorb those prices. The biggest risk to retailers, and really manufacturers is losing sales. So they will pay the higher freight rates, and ultimately eat it in some of their margins.

But, look, we've seen in the past earnings, this past earnings cycle that, corporate profits are are at record highs. So there is, some ability for retailers and manufacturers to absorb higher freight rates. Ultimately, they wanna get their products into the country. They wanna get their products moving to in consumers. So they'll pay the higher rates, and ultimately, consumers are gonna see a marginal impact. Not anything to worry about.

What we worry about more about is demand erosion, which right now we're seeing the opposite. We're seeing particularly in the industrial side, things pick up, and consumer activity looks pretty strong. Consumer volumes, you can look at the container lines. The reason the ports are doing so well is because consumers are buying goods and retailers are feeling much more confident about consumer activity, which I think is very strong.

So I wouldn't I wouldn't take any of the higher freight rates as a concern. Remember, we were at $22,000 in container prices, spot prices back during the peak of COVID, and we're only at $7,000 right now. So there's a lot of room to go before I think there'll be substantial inflation. So give us an update then on the intra freight carrier wars. Right? So we have FedEx freight down more than 4% since its spin off back in May, partially because Amazon has entered the scene.

What's going on with Terrain Grab? Who's winning? Yeah. I mean, ultimately, Amazon I mean, it's sort of the worst kept secret. Amazon was known to get into it. FedEx spun it off. When it spun off, it's really a reflection of just how mean, it spun off at a very high valuations, cold off a bit from where it over the original spin off was. There's been a little bit of just I think investors have rallied the transports for the last seven, eight months and really just pulling off here, a little bit of profit taking.

And I think everybody's wanting to see the second half and and get confirmation that things are continuing to be bullish, and we're continuing to see things ramp. That is our our channel checks have shown that. There's a bit of a modal shift. We're seeing freight move off of trucking slightly into intermodal, which is by rail, simply because there's been a lot of movement in freight rates in trucking, and so they were seeing things put onto the railroads.

And right now, the spread between trucking rates and rail freight is 34%. That is near an all time high, and therefore, the railroads are the primary beneficiaries and companies like J. V. Hunt and Hub Group that are public are really picking up a lot of share right now. Wow. Interesting. Finally, Craig, and we don't have much time left, but you have advocated in the past for a domestic marine industry, right, to ensure security and supply chains and so on.

Are you hearing anything about the administration potentially taking stakes in any businesses surrounding supply chains, the network, marine industry, trucking industry, anything or like that? Any whisperings at all in the community? Well, I mean, look. I don't think the administration's gonna take any trucking investments. It's the most fragmented market. But when we talk about, maritime, there is certainly some, different, bills, executive orders that have tried to encourage maritime investment.

There was a story not too long ago about a startup that's going to build ships, commercial ships, that it was o

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