Import demand has not been a primary driver of the recent turbulence in the domestic freight market, unlike the pandemic-era cyclical tightening. The Inbound Ocean TEUs Volume Index (IOTI), a 14-day moving average of requests to move twenty-foot containers to the U.S. by ocean, peaked at 2,692 in June 2021. Its current reading of 1,715 is far below that record and sits closer to multi-year lows for this time of year, though this does not necessarily indicate weak demand.

Read also: Logistics and Freight Transportation Trends

During 2024 and 2025, shippers worried about service disruptions and tariffs, prompting them to order far ahead of expected delivery in a just-in-case inventory strategy. According to the inventory level component of the Logistics Managers Index, which tracks whether companies are expanding or reducing stockpiles, there have been two notable periods of inventory accumulation since 2019. In early 2022, inventories expanded at an unprecedented rate as demand softened and shipping congestion eased, followed by a sharp reduction in late 2022 and early 2023.

In 2024, shippers began rebuilding stockpiles as Middle East conflict threatened ocean capacity and service reliability. After that concern subsided in early 2025, tariffs became a growing worry, leading to erratic ordering and inventory growth. Once tariff anxieties eased in late 2025, orders returned to a more conventional pattern and now closely track inventory levels, reflecting a leaner just-in-time approach.

Leaner warehouses tied to just-in-time practices reduce inventory costs but are less able to handle demand spikes and require more dependable transportation. This comes as the trucking sector emerges from one of its longest and softest downturns in years, leaving it poorly positioned to adjust to any demand increase.

The SONAR Truckload Volume Index (STVI), which tracks electronic tender requests from shippers to carriers for truckload capacity, has matched its current level multiple times in recent years, but rejection rates were much lower then. This is because capacity has been steadily exiting the market for three years, a trend that appears to have been hastened by heightened regulatory enforcement.

Source: IndexBox Market Intelligence Platform