FTR Associates' latest truck market forecast registers yet another downward revision to the near term freight and truck production forecast.


Four full quarters of economic shrinkage brand this downturn as a full-blown recession, highlighted by a 4 percent (annualized) fall in GDP during the current quarter, according to FTR.

The freight market is forecast to fall for seven consecutive quarters, bottoming out in the third quarter of 2009 at more than 9 percent below the year-end 2007 level, FTR says. Moreover, the most recent economic data reports indicate that the U.S. GDP annualized change for the fourth quarter may be as much as a 6 percent drop. FTR says this is early evidence that the 1982-like recession they have been warning clients about could be under way.

If we're looking at a 1982-like recession, FTR Associates says, truck tonnage would fall by 10 percent year over year. It follows that trucking margins will decline as well as equipment purchases, perhaps below the 75,000 level for U.S. retail sales in 2009.

In its December forecast, FTR predicts that Class 8 North American factory shipments will end up at 193,084 for 2008, and will fall by 25 percent to 144,902 in 2009, rising to 162,211 in 2010.