66% of logistics pros say talent quality β not cost β is the #1 factor in choosing a nearshore partner. Rapido's integration model explains why that's the right question to be asking.
Plus, a carrier pleading guilty to mob money laundering while still FMCSA-active, Iran's first post-ceasefire attack and what it means for diesel surcharges, FedEx Freight's first earnings as a standalone company, and more in today's newsletter.
Freight brokers are measuring their inboxes wrong. Most inbound email is monitoring, not work. And the longtail categories that look like noise are costing real margin. Here's how to audit what's actually in your inbox, and why it matters in 2026's margin-first market.
S&P is cautiously optimistic about the freight recovery, but it still kept RXO's rating below investment grade. Plus: the Strait is set to reopen, Volvo pulls the safety driver, the U.S. goes after cheap trailers, and more.
Happy Monday. S&P is cautiously optimistic about the freight recovery, but it still kept RXO's rating below investment grade. We break down why in today's feature.
Plus:
β The Strait Is Set To Reopen. The U.S. and Iran reached a deal Sunday to end nearly four months of war, with the Strait of Hormuz set to reopen toll-free once the agreement is signed Friday in Switzerland. The Straits closure, which has been in place since late February, pushed diesel and oil prices higher while U.S. inflation climbed to 4.2% in May. Container analyst Lars Jensen of Vespucci Maritime cautions that a full return to normal will take two to three months, since the strait still needs mine clearing before ships trust the passage. Markets moved fast on the news anyway, with U.S. crude dropping below $80 a barrel for the first time since March.
π€ Volvo Pulls the Safety Driver in Early 2027. Volvo Autonomous Solutions, the unit that builds the driverless VNL truck, confirmed at its Capital Markets Day that it will remove safety drivers and begin fully autonomous runs in Texas in the first quarter of 2027, using self-driving software from its partner Aurora. Volvo hauls freight commercially today with safety drivers still aboard, and it wants more than 300 driverless trucks running by the end of 2027, up from roughly 20 now. It's not alone on the road: Aurora already runs its own fully driverless service between Dallas and Houston on PACCAR trucks for customers like Uber Freight and McLane.
π The U.S. Goes After Cheap Trailers. American makers Great Dane, Stoughton, and Wabash filed a trade case last November, accusing China, Mexico, and Canada of dumping cheap dry vans and reefers into the US. Commerce just handed them a first win with a preliminary antidumping duty of 130.76% on Chinese trailers. The catch is that China shipped only 38 trailers here in 2024 while Mexico shipped 47,441, much of it from mainstream suppliers like Hyundai Translead that US fleets buy every year, so the ruling that matters comes July 30 when Commerce issues its preliminary call on Mexico. If measures are put on Mexican trailers, expect van and reefer prices for Mexican-made trailers to rise significantly.
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Spot rates are at all-time highs, RXO's stock has climbed 82% over the past year, and the freight recovery narrative has never been louder.
But when S&P Global looked at RXO last week, it saw a company whose own numbers haven't caught up to the story the market is telling.
The agency affirmed RXO's debt rating at BB, two notches into non-investment-grade territory, and maintained its negative outlook.
S&P isn't fully ruling out a recovery.
"We are cautiously optimistic that the recent rebound represents the beginning of a gradual (and sustainable) improvement in truck pricing," S&P said.
But it flagged a risk most people aren't talking about: higher rates make trucking profitable again, drivers re-enter the market, capacity softens, and the ceiling on the current rate environment drops.
RXO's CEO doesn't see it that way. In an interview with FreightWaves, Drew Wilkerson said that for the first time in his career, he's watching a supply-driven inflection with staying power.
"It's not something that is a blip in the market. It's not something that's caused by the produce season. It's not something that's caused by weather. It's something that's continued out because of the regulations that have been implemented. That's a structural change in the industry that's not going away." Wilkerson said.
He may be right about the market. The question S&P is asking is narrower: even if rates hold, can RXO make money on them the way it used to?
The numbers say not lately. Adjusted EBITDA fell to $177 million in 2025 from a peak of $366 million in 2022, even as RXO nearly doubled its brokerage revenue by acquiring Coyote. More volume, weaker margins.
S&P said RXO was once an industry leader on margins, and that three years of downturn pushed it down to levels matching or trailing its peers, naming Echo Global Logistics, which carries a B- rating four notches below RXO.
The other end of that spectrum is C.H. Robinson. S&P upgraded Robinson back to BBB+, investment grade, in August 2025, citing a 27% headcount cut and margin discipline that pushed its funds from operations-to-debt ratio above 45%. RXO sits at 17%.
Same market, same downturn, three different outcomes:
S&P expects the sector-wide recovery to lift earnings across the board, but it's explicit that RXO's rating stabilization is now contingent on margin outperformance relative to peers, not just revenue growth.
The agency forecasts RXO's EBITDA margin improving from 3.1% in 2025 to 3.8% in 2026 and 4.2% in 2027. That's progress, but it's still below where the company stood in 2022, and it assumes the rate environment holds.
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π₯ Medline Warehouse Burns to the Ground. A fire destroyed Medline's 1-million-square-foot distribution center in Tracy, California, threatening medical supply deliveries to hospitals across the western US.
π₯© JBS Shutters a Major East Coast Beef Plant. JBS is closing its Souderton, Pennsylvania, plant, one of the biggest on the East Coast, as a 75-year-low US cattle herd forces the world's largest meatpacker to cut capacity faster than analysts expected.
π¨ Indiana Sidelines 1,147 in a Month. Indiana State Police inspected 4,694 commercial vehicles between mid-April and mid-May and placed 505 drivers and 642 trucks out of service, along with issuing 259 overweight violations.
πͺͺ The Lawsuits Are Losing. States have revoked more than 28,000 non-domiciled CDLs since the new federal rules took effect, and the unions and driver groups suing to stop it have mostly lost, with a D.C. appeals court declining to block the rule in May.
π Turns Out Green Tech Hates Trucks. DHL is flagging clean-energy equipment as one of the trickier things to haul right now.
π’ LA Forecasts 7% Fewer Boxes. The country's top container gateway is projecting a decline in volume heading into the rest of 2026.
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Plus, a carrier pleading guilty to mob money laundering while still FMCSA-active, Iran's first post-ceasefire attack and what it means for diesel surcharges, FedEx Freight's first earnings as a standalone company, and more in today's newsletter.
Bad carriers are gaming the weigh station system. Plus, C.H. Robinson's own engineer goes scorched earth on Reddit, the Ghost Truck Act gets roasted, and more in today's newsletter.
Plus, overseas ELD tampering, 100 pallets of stolen womenswear, 20,000 Mexican truckers losing US visas, and more in today's newsletter.
While everyone in trucking is watching rates, capacity, and fraud, a much bigger shift may be happening quietly in the background: the future of rail.
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