spot freight

LM Group News Editor Jeff Berman recently spoke with Drew McElroy, Co-Founder and Chairman of New York-based Transfix, a logistics technology services provider that streamlines shipment data to better help shippers make informed decisions to optimize time and revenues. McElroy offered up insight on various topics, including the impact of COVID-19 on the e-commerce supply chain, market conditions, inventory, management, capacity, and the spot market, among others.

The August edition of the DAT Truckload Volume Index, which was issued this week by DAT Freight & Analytics, a subsidiary of Roper Technologies and operator of an online marketplace for spot market truckload freight, highlighted how spot market truckload rates approached all-time highs in August, with various trucking segments seeing rate and load-to-truck ratio gains.

With the second quarter quickly coming to a close, data issued by DAT, a subsidiary of Roper Technologies and operator of an online marketplace for spot market truckload freight, showed significant increases in truckload rates and ratios, for the week of June 22-28, as shippers take steps to get their freight moving in advance of the Fourth of July holiday and the mid-year point of 2020.

DAT reported that posted loads, for the week, headed up 15.6%, following a slower trajectory the previous week, with spot van and refrigerated rates regaining momentum that had been building up in previous weeks.

The most recent edition of the Coyote Curve by Coyote Logistics, a subsidiary of freight transportation and logistics services bellwether UPS, indicated that truckload market conditions remain challenged, due largely to COVID-19, with the caveat that they may have bottomed out in April.

DAT said that its DAT Truckload Volume Index, which reflects the change in the number of loads with a pickup date during that month, with the actual index number normalized each month to accommodate any new data sources without distortion, with a baseline of 100 equal to the number of loads moved in January 2015, fell 19% from March to April and was off 8% annually.

On the heels of an active March, which largely saw notable gains for spot market load volumes and rates for van and reefer equipment, that were driven by various factors, including urgent orders, or restocking, of retail goods, due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, spot truckload volume and rates saw significant declines from March 30-April 4, according to data issued this week by DAT.

Data recently issued by Portland, Oregon-based freight marketplace platform and information provider DAT, a subsidiary of Roper Technologies, for the month of October, in its DAT Truckload Volume Index, pointed to the highest number of spot market loads in any month going back to January 2015.

A new offering released today by Seattle-based digital freight broker Convoy offers motor carriers access to ten times the amount of spot freight from the biggest shippers in the United States. Entitled direct-from-shipper loads, Convoy said this offering removes the need for shippers to work with multiple brokers and subsequently provide each carrier with a small fraction of their spot loads that is typically at 10% or less.