Trailer Orders End 2016 on Strong Note, Climbing Above 34,000
Net trailer orders in December were the second-highest of the year, and improved year-over-year as well, but 2016 remained significantly weaker than 2015, ACT Research said.
Trailer orders climbed to 34,713, compared with 26,968 a year earlier.
“Yes, we had some good strength at the end of the year, but some of that was timing. It was solid orders [overall] but less robust then we would have seen the previous year,” Frank Maly, ACT’s director of commercial vehicle transportation research and analysis, told Transport Topics.
Every trailer category that it measured was down in 2016 compared with last year, as expected, ACT reported.
For the full year, orders reached 228,643 while there were 315,961 in the 2015 period, ACT said.
“We are looking for business to be lower in 2017 than in 2016 based upon less replacement volume ... and fewer additions to the fleets,” Maly said.
At the same time, cancellation rates have improved over the past couple of months, he said, calling them “very acceptable.”
Cancellations were particularly high in August, he said.
“But a lot of those pressures seem to be past us ... [as far as] fleets making dramatic adjustments to their investment plans,” Maly said.
