U.S. Trailer Backlog Improves Month Over Month, Build Up 2% Year Over Year

U.S. Trailer backlog continued to be positive in November, with a stronger than expected 18% sequential improvement, which was more than double the gains projected by seasonals.

“Dry vans, up 23% month over month, and reefers, up 18% month over month, provided most of the support; most vocational trailer categories posted single-digit gains,” said Frank Maly, Director–CV Transportation Analysis and Research at ACT Research. He continued, “Liquid tanks, up 24% month over month, were a notable exception.”

Total production was off 12% month over month, but up 2% year over year. The majority of that difference came from November’s holiday-impacted schedule, down two days from October. “Reefers posted the largest decline, with build off 20%,” said Maly. He continued, “That was more than twice the decline projected by seasonals and the weakest monthly production since November 2013. We expect reefer production rates to improve in December, before moving seasonally lower in Q1 2018.”

Commenting on shipments, Maly noted “Year-to-day, factory shipments have nearly caught up with last year. Through November, shipments are off a fraction of a percent, with the industry shipping over 263,000 trailers so far this year, and we project a small positive year-over-year gain when the full year results are in.”