US Trailer Orders Fall Almost 38% Year-Over-Year
U.S. net trailer orders fell 37.6% year-over-year as some fleets remained cautious about adding equipment and cancellations increased, according to ACT Research Co.
Orders were 15,300, a preliminary estimate that will be revised later in the month, ACT said. August 2015 orders reached 24,532.
“While normal seasonal patterns indicate August as a fairly modest order month, that year-over-year performance implies caution by fleets regarding their investment commitments, and likely sets the industry up for a restrained 2016-2017 order season,” said Frank Maly, ACT’s director of commercial vehicle transportation analysis and research.
Initial reports indicating higher cancellation activity in August are “further indication of fleets’ shifting intentions," Maly said.
He added a spot of welcome, but tempered, news was the 50% month-over-month jump in orders compared with July’s 10,147.
Stifel, Nicolaus & Co. analyst Michael Baudendistel wrote in a note, “This result was in line with our expectation that orders would increase sequentially from July given seasonality and commentary from Wabash National Corp. on its most recent analyst call in July that it had received verbal commitments for 5,000 units that it expected to convert into firm orders in August.”
Baudendistel wrote he expected September’s orders to increase also month-over-month but be lower year-over-year “against difficult 2015 comps, as the fall of last year is the time period when semi-trailers most significantly outperformed Class 8 orders.”
September 2015’s trailer order total was 35,952.
Orders for Class 8 trucks last September were 20,972, according to WardsAuto.com.
