American Trucking Associations’ (ATA) announced this week its advanced seasonally adjusted (SA) For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index increased 1.1% in October after declining 1.1% in September.
In October, the index equaled 115.2 (2015=100) compared with 113.9 in September, ATA says.
“After hitting a floor in April, tonnage has slowly and inconsistently improved, but remains 3% below its recent peak in September 2022,” says ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello. “Despite the monthly gain, truck freight remains soft as it continues to contract on a year-over-year basis. It is important to remember that our for-hire truck freight index, which includes both truckload and LTL freight, is dominated by contract freight with minimal amounts of spot market loads. The traditional spot market remains much weaker than contract tonnage.”
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ATA reports September’s decline was unchanged from its last update. Compared with October 2022, the SA index fell 2.1%, which was the eighth straight year over year decrease. In September, the index was down 4.1% from a year earlier. The not seasonally adjusted index, which represents the change in tonnage actually hauled by the fleets before any seasonal adjustment, equaled 119.7 in October, 6.3% above the September level (112.5).
In calculating the index, 100 represents 2015. ATA’s For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index is dominated by contract freight as opposed to spot market freight.
