Hub Group - Earnings Call - Q1 2025

Executive Summary

• Q1 2025 revenue fell 8% year-over-year to $0.915B, while diluted EPS was $0.44 (flat YoY) and operating margin improved to 4.1% from 3.7% on cost controls and Logistics margin gains.
• Versus consensus, EPS modestly beat while revenue missed and EBITDA modestly beat; management lowered FY 2025 guidance on tariff-related demand uncertainty and reduced capex, removing container purchases in 2025.
• Intermodal volumes rose 8% YoY; brokerage volumes declined 9% amid limited spot opportunities; operational KPIs improved (empty repositioning costs -17%, insourced dray +400bps sequentially, turn times +4%).
• Stock reaction catalysts: lowered FY guide (EPS and revenue), resilience in Intermodal volumes, Mexico JV growth (EASO), and $40M cost reduction program that may support margin trajectory through 2H if demand stabilizes.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

What Went Well

• Operating margin up 40bps YoY to 4.1% driven by yield management, cost containment, and operating efficiency; Logistics margin improved 70bps YoY to 5.7%.
• Intermodal volumes +8% YoY with strong execution in bid season and network improvements; local East +13%, local West +5%, Mexico volumes growing significantly via EASO JV.
• Cost actions and safety programs reduced insurance and claims; empty repositioning costs -17% YoY, insourced dray increased by ~400bps sequentially, turn times +4% YoY.

Quote: “We remained focused on yield management, cost containment and operating efficiency initiatives, resulting in an operating income margin of 4.1%, a 40-basis point improvement over last year…”.

What Went Wrong

• Consolidated revenue declined 8% YoY; Intermodal revenue per load down ~12% due to fuel mix/price; brokerage volumes -9% and revenue per load -10% amid limited spot opportunities.
• Tariff uncertainty expected to create a near-term import “air pocket” impacting West Coast demand, pressuring sequential ITS results in Q2 before potential normalization in Q3.
• FY 2025 guidance lowered (EPS, revenue, capex) versus Q4 outlook due to import slowdown risk and consumer uncertainty; base case now excludes peak season surcharges.

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Hello, and welcome to the Hub Group First Quarter 2025 earnings conference call. Phil Yeager, Hub's President, Chief Executive Officer, and Vice Chairman, and Kevin Beth, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer, are joining the call. At this time, all participants are on a listen-only mode. A brief question-and-answer session will follow the prepared remarks. In order for everyone to have an opportunity to participate, please limit your inquiries to one primary and one follow-up question. Statements made on this call and any other reference documents on our website that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risk, uncertainties, and other factors that might cause actual results to this performance of Hub Group to differ materially from those expressed or implied by this discussion, and therefore should be viewed with caution.

Further information on the risks that may affect Hub Group's business is included in the filings with the SEC, which are on our website. In addition, on today's call, non-GAAP financial measures will be used. Reconciliations between GAAP and non-GAAP financial measures are included in our earnings release and quarterly earnings presentation. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to your host, Phil Yeager. You may now begin.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Good afternoon, and welcome to Hub Group's first quarter earnings call. Joining me today is Kevin Beth, Hub Group's Chief Financial Officer, and Garrett Holland, our Senior Vice President of Investor Relations. I would like to start by thanking our thousands of team members across North America for their efforts to support our customers and our Hub Group family through this dynamic market. These efforts drove a 40 basis point improvement in operating margins during the quarter and are setting us up for success both in the current market and long term. Our customers have taken different approaches to managing through the implementation of tariffs, with the majority taking a wait-and-see approach, while others pulled forward inventory depending on their end markets, product types, and origin of their finished goods.

It remains unclear what the near and long-term impacts will be, as many of our customers have diversified their vendor base and supply chains to ensure fluidity through these potential disruptions. However, this has also created an increased focus for our customers to drive savings in their supply chain, which is supporting over-the-road conversions to intermodal and increasing the pipeline for our consolidation and managed transportation solutions. There will likely be a near-term impact to import volumes to the West Coast, but the magnitude remains uncertain as our volumes have remained steady. We are closely monitoring the situation while staying in constant communication with our clients on their needs.

Through this current turbulence in global trade, we are focusing on what we can control, winning profitable growth across all of our segments by leveraging our great service, decreasing costs through our newly implemented $40 million cost reduction program, and maintaining our strong balance sheet for lower long-term leverage targets, giving us flexibility to invest in our business, return capital to shareholders, which totaled $21 million in the quarter, identify strategic acquisition opportunities, and preserve our strong culture and team. I will now discuss our business results, starting with ITX, where we delivered an 8% increase in year-over-year operating margin due to improvements in dedicated operations, higher intermodal volumes, and the EASO joint venture. This margin improvement was partially offset by slightly lower revenue driven by declines in dedicated volume due to lower demand, as well as small loss sites and lower intermodal revenue per load.

Intermodal volumes increased 8% year-over-year due to bid wins, a pull forward of inventory, and benefit from the EASO transaction. Local East volumes increased 13%, local West increased 5%, and transcount shipments were down 1% year-over-year, while we had significant volume growth in Mexico through organic expansion and our joint venture. Revenue decreased due to a 12% decline in revenue per load, which was impacted by fuel mix and price. We are executing well in bid season, onboarding wins with a mix of new and existing customers, and network beneficial lanes due to our excellent service. We are closely monitoring award compliance, and although shipping patterns have been more erratic, we are seeing improvements as we onboard new awards. During the quarter, we reduced insurance expense, increased our in-source dray percentage, drove better container utilization, and emptied repositioning costs, while cost per dray and driver productivity remained relatively flat year-over-year.

We have further actions in place to enhance these operational areas and anticipate further improvement in the quarters ahead. In dedicated, we are operating in a competitive environment, and while we have had losses of smaller sites to one-way truckload, we have had a strong renewal rate and new wins we are onboarding. We improved our revenue per truck per day by 9% year-over-year in the quarter and are focused on delivering value to our customers through our strong service levels and cost reductions. In logistics, our operating margin percentage improved 70 basis points year-over-year due to improved efficiency in our facilities, as well as the completion of the network alignment initiative, but was offset by lower margins in our brokerage. We experienced a larger decline in revenue at brokerage due to limited spot market opportunities and declining rates, as well as negative mix.

This was offset by better relative performance in our contractual logistics offerings. Brokerage volume declined 9% year-over-year with a 10% decline in revenue per load, which was primarily driven by lower fuel price and mix. Our LTL offering is performing well, helping to drive sequential margin improvement from the fourth quarter. We also reduced negative margin shipments by 210 basis points year-over-year and are winning with new and existing customers in bid season while reducing our purchased transportation costs. In our managed solutions, we delivered operating margin percentage improvement in all of our services, the largest being in CFS, following the implementation of operational efficiency enhancements and our network alignment initiative completion. This has led to an 1,100 basis point improvement in warehouse utilization year-over-year.

We are focused on growth across all of our offerings and improving our cost basis through productivity enhancements, and we have a strong pipeline as we leverage our scale and service to compete and win in the market. With that, I will hand it over to Kevin to discuss our financial results.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Thank you, Phil. I will walk through our financial results before commenting on our outlook. Our reported revenue for the first quarter was $915 million. Revenue decreased by 8% compared to last year and was in line with fourth quarter revenue. ITX revenue was $530 million, which is down 4% from prior year's revenue of $552 million, as intermodal volume growth of 8% was offset by lower intermodal revenue per load due to a change in mix and slightly lower dedicated revenue in the quarter. Additionally, lower fuel revenue of approximately $11 million negatively impacted the top line. The logistics segment revenue was $411 million compared to $480 million in the prior year due to lower volume and revenue per load in our brokerage business, exiting of unprofitable business in CFS, and seasonal softness in our managed transportation and final mile lines of business.

Lower fuel revenue of $14 million in the quarter also contributed to the decrease. Moving down the P&L, for the quarter, purchase transportation and warehousing costs were $658 million, a decrease of $82 million from the prior year due to strong cost controls as well as lower rail and warehouse expenses. This results in a 220 basis point improvement on a % of revenue basis when compared to Q1 of 2024. Salaries and benefits of $149 million were $5 million higher than the prior year due to additional employee drivers and warehouse team members and the EASO transactions. Total legacy headcount, which excludes acquisition employees, drivers, and warehouse employees, was lower than last year by 7% as we continue to manage headcount across the organization. Depreciation and amortization decreased $6 million over Q1 2024 due to our updated useful life assumptions.

Insurance and claims expense decreased by $2 million as we continue to see our safety focus and training programs pay dividends. Even after the EASO transaction last quarter, our cost controls allowed our general and administration expenses to remain in line with prior year. As a result, our operating income increased year-over-year with an operating income margin of 4.1% for the quarter, an increase of 40 basis points over the prior year. ITX quarterly operating margin was 2.7%, a 30 basis point improvement over prior year. The first quarter logistics operating margin was 5.7%, a 70 basis point improvement over Q1 2024. EBITDA was $85 million in the first quarter. Overall, Hub earned an EPS of $0.44 in the first quarter, in line with Q1 2024. Now, turning to our cash flow. Cash flow from operations for the first three months of 2025 was $70 million.

First quarter capital expenditures totaled $19 million, with the majority of spend related to tractor replacements, with technology making up the remainder of the spend. Our balance sheet and financial position remained strong. Through the first quarter, we returned $21 million to shareholders through dividends and stock repurchases as we purchased $14 million of shares and issued our quarterly dividend of $12.50 per share. Net debt was $140 million, which is 0.4 times EBITDA, below our stated net debt to EBITDA range of 0.75 times to 1.25 times. EBITDA less CapEx was $65 million in the first quarter. We are pleased with our cash EPS of $0.55. The spread between EPS and cash EPS was $0.11 for the quarter, and we ended the quarter with $141 million of cash.

Turning to our 2025 guidance, we expect full-year EPS in the range of $1.75-$2.25 and revenue to be between $3.6 billion-$4 billion for the full year. We project an effective tax rate of approximately 24%. We also expect capital expenditures in the range of $40-$50 million as we focus on replacement for tractors that have reached their end of life and technology projects. We do not plan to purchase containers in 2025. Our assumptions at the high end of the range include either a short West Coast slowdown of China imports or a strong bounce back of demand in the West Coast, leading to a surge of volume in the back half of the year that allows for increased pricing for peak season surcharges.

The low end of the range would be due to an extended slowdown in China imports and/or the weakening of consumer spending. The decrease in volume and margin dollars would be partially offset by further cost management efforts. The assumptions in the middle of the range contemplate a volume decrease in the second half of the second quarter due to our customers changing shipping patterns to combat tariffs, with a return to directional seasonality in the third quarter as consumer strength holds. Additionally, we should recognize additional cost-saving benefits through the year as the team remains committed to discipline expense management. For the ITX segment, we expect pricing to be relatively flat for the remainder of the year as we continue to focus on network needs and new customer acquisitions.

We think there is upside should we see a bounce back of volume, which would allow for peak season surcharges and pricing increases. Due to the expected second quarter slowdown, we expect sequential operating results to be flat to down from first quarter. We would expect to be back to normal seasonal operating income patterns. We expect dedicated revenue to be less than 2024 as new customers are not enough to offset lost customers and demand softness. For logistics, excluding our brokerage business, we expect some general softness in demand, but there should be some mitigating factors affecting revenue. In our warehouse business, if we experience lower transportation revenue, we expect to see an increase in storage revenue, and in our final mile and managed transportation business, we have a good pipeline, which, if onboarded, could offset slower shipping from current customers.

For brokerage, we expect volume for the remainder of the year to be flat to down from current volume results, with pricing to continue at current levels. The business has potential upside if we see a pronounced bounce back in inventory restocking. We continue to manage what we can control, and our cost-savings initiatives have resulted in improved profitability. We are pleased with the progress the team has made as the operating income percentage increased in both segments: ITX with 30 basis points and logistics with 70 basis points of growth, resulting in a 1% increase in consolidated operating income or growth of 40 basis points on a percent-to-revenue basis. We also reported Q1 intermodal volume growth of 8%, pre-cash flow of $51 million, and cash EPS of $0.55. As we manage through this unpredictable environment, our longer-term strategy continues to guide us.

We remain focused on managing our people costs, reducing discretionary spending, and driving down transportation costs. At the same time, our strong balance sheet allows us to make value-add acquisitions. As I have noted in the past, the important strategic changes we have made to our business, including our focus on yield management, asset utilization, and operating expense efficiency, and investing in asset-light logistics offerings, have significantly improved profitability, predictability, pre-cash flow, and returns. We believe these strategic changes allow Hub Group to be successful in a variety of macroeconomic environments. With that, I'll turn it over to the operator to open the line to any questions.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. I would also like to remind participants that this call is being recorded and a replay will be available on the Hub Group website for 30 days. To ask a question, please press star one one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one one again. Please stand by while we compile the Q&A roster. Our first question is from Scott Group of Wolf Research LLC. Your question, please.

Scott Group (Analyst)

Hey, thanks. Afternoon, guys. Can you just talk about what % of intermodal is tied to West Coast ports? I think in the past, you give us monthly trends, maybe just give us the monthly trends and what April was. I know this is a bunch, but all sort of in the same vein. It feels like this import cliff is starting this week. Just what you're expecting to happen to your volumes going forward.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Sure. Yeah. I'll start. I'll start with volume trends. January was up 18, February was up 1, March was up 7, and then April was up 6. Thus far in May, we haven't seen the slowdown that is obviously much anticipated, but at this point, not showing up in our data. We think that's going to be varying by customer and how much they've pulled forward, how much seasonal product they have, how much diversification in their sourcing strategy they've been able to execute on. As far as exposure with China, about 25% of our West Coast volume is port-related, 30% of that coming from China. We are obviously anticipating that slowdown. Once again, will vary by customer, but we're also going to have opportunities to reduce costs. Our energy repositioning costs are going to go down.

We're going to insource more of our drayage, as Kevin mentioned in the prepared remarks. Our storage revenue and warehouse utilization will improve. We're certainly monitoring it closely, but once again, haven't seen an impact at this point.

Scott Group (Analyst)

What's the typical lag from when it shows up at a port to when it shows up in your volume? Do you have a sense? Is there a lot of freight at the ports or near the ports and warehouses that was still built up too? Do you still have volume to move even if there's not a lot of new stuff coming into the ports? Is that possibly happening?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. Yeah. I would agree with you. I think it takes a few weeks, and we haven't seen that show up yet. Yes, indications are there's still a good amount of warehouses and still clearing through the port infrastructure. Yes, we're staying very close with our customers on it. Once again, it's going to vary by customer and by end market and by product type. It really is a vary by customer. We're having to stay very close and just really watch those day-to-day, week-to-week award compliances and forecasts from our clients.

Scott Group (Analyst)

Okay. Helpful. Then last one, I'll pass it off. Any update you can give us just on bid season and what kind of pricing you're seeing?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. Yeah. I would say it's competitive, but certainly not irrational. If you look at Q1, there was actually a pull forward of bids. We had about 48% of our business get bid in Q1, which we think was actually advantageous for intermodal. Truckload carriers came out with a little bit more aggression on rate. That led our customers, I think, to look at the cost differential as well as the service product we're delivering in intermodal and push a little bit more conversion than they may have otherwise. In Q2, 38% of our business is getting bid out. I would say it's been a little bit more aggressive, which is leading us to really say we think flattish on pricing for the full year. We've executed our bid plan. We've done really well in backhaul lanes and efficient business for our drivers.

We're growing well in the East and in Mexico, and also with our temperature-controlled products. We've added 50 new logos thus far through bid season. Really pleased with those results. I think the focus for us is keep delivering a great service product, keep reducing costs so we can compete and win, and we'll be in a good position as we see volume normalize.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Scott, this is Kevin. Just for our normal cadence on bids is about 30%-35% in first quarter and about 35% in second quarter. You can see that bid pull forward that Phil was talking about.

Scott Group (Analyst)

Thank you, guys. Appreciate it.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Bascome Majors of Susquehanna Financial Group.

Bascome Majors (Analyst)

Thanks for taking my questions. Maybe adding a little more qualitative commentary to that. Can you walk through how your conversations with your largest customers, which are the largest retailers, with sophisticated ways to deal with this situation, how has that evolved over the last six, seven weeks? Are your forecasts in the kind of high-end, low-end scenarios or revenue that you talked about tied to what they're sharing with you for their forecast? Just trying to understand how quickly this is moving and how much visibility you think you do or don't have at this point. Thank you.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Sure. Yeah. This is Phil. I think we do anticipate a drop in import demand in the second half of the second quarter. I think the scenarios or potential outcomes we're trying to lay out are if we see a quick rebound and things snap back really quickly, and we're getting surcharges, then you're at that high end of the range that we gave you. If it's really prolonged and you started to see it impact the consumer, you could be at that low end. Based on what we know, there's probably somewhere in the middle that things will land. That's kind of the midpoint of the range. Based on what we're seeing with our customers, the discussions we've had with them, there is some pull forward that's occurred, certainly.

I mean, you look at our January volumes of 18%, there was certainly pull forward, but not enough where inventories are overstacked at this point. There is also a whole lot of seasonal shipping that needs to occur that has not taken place yet. Our customers, many had already been proactive in diversifying their supply chains and vendor base, and others are reacting more in real time. I would tell you it is also quite varied in how people have managed through it. Those that were more concentrated on Chinese imports pulled forward. Those that did not are taking that wait-and-see approach. It really has been a mix. Once again, we are watching it closely. This guidance is really based on those variety of potential outcomes and informed by the discussions we are having with our customers and what we anticipate happening.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. Bascome, this is Kevin. I'll just add, certainly we're taking as many data points as we can get our hands on when we're coming up with our scenarios. Yes, that factors in what we're hearing from customers, but also what we're reading and what's available publicly.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

The last thing I'd add is the primary impact, at least in the near term, would be ITS or intermodal. Our other businesses are going to be somewhat more resilient through this. Our managed transportation business is not as import-heavy. Our warehousing business is going to see an influx of storage demand likely. We have some offsets, and obviously we're doing a good job managing costs to ensure we're in a good position.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Finally, one thing I would add is this really gives Hub that opportunity to work with our customers and show them that we can save them money and come up with better transportation spend to really meet their needs. That is an opportunity that we're trying to take advantage of as well.

Bascome Majors (Analyst)

If we work backwards from the holidays through this uncertainty and just think about retail inventory needing to move inland and hit store shelves by November, early December, when do you think that you'll have the visibility in those decisions on how to manage that this will be made by those customers?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. I think there is certainly an air pocket of freight that is coming. I think there is going to be some replacement of that from other origin points. There, once again, are those seasonal items, back to school, Halloween, that are going to need to be brought in, or you are going to miss sales. I think for the holidays, you typically see Q3 be our strongest shipping quarter, late August, September, and then October are normally our strongest shipping months. To get that product, you are really seeing those decisions in the July time frame, late June, early July. We should hopefully start to see it in the data at that point. I think if there is clarity around trade, the consumers remain resilient, and people are going to ship. Once again, inventories just have not been overly built in a lot of the segments that we operate in.

We're keeping a close eye on it, though, and we'll certainly continue to stay very close to our customers.

Bascome Majors (Analyst)

Thank you all.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Bruce Chan of Stifel.

Bruce Chan (Analyst)

Yeah. Thanks, operator. And good afternoon, everyone. Kevin, you talked about some of the additional levers that you can pull on to offset some of the pressure if the environment kind of trends towards the better side of the outlook. That was certainly helpful. Specific to headcount, last year, I think you talked about headcount being down about, I want to say, 3%. Where was headcount this quarter? If you think about a potential deterioration in the market, where can that number sort of go to?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. This is Phil. I'll start. So headcount was down 7%. I mentioned in my prepared remarks, we have about $40 million of cost stats that we're executing on. Half of that's been implemented, really, at the time of the call. You start to see that kind of back half of Q2 and more materially in the third quarter, and we'll implement the remainder as the year progresses. Two-thirds of that is about purchase transportation, so drayage, truckload, LTL, as well as temporary labor in the warehouses. The other third is more salaries and benefits, weighted with the reduction in headcount, not backfilling roles that are necessary. We're also doing a really nice job and have made some significant reductions in our outsourced labor there as well. Once again, we're controlling what we can.

We want to be in a position where we can support our customers as we see a rebound in demand as well. We are certainly being thoughtful in our approach around it, but obviously see opportunities to reduce costs as well.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. Just to add that we also have some of our technology implementations that are paying off. We're seeing some reduced spend in our outsource support systems that we needed for some legacy IT, as well as the consulting on the IT spend is coming down as well. We have pretty much every facet we've looked under, and we're finding things that are allowing us to decrease costs. As Phil mentioned, several of those programs have already been implemented. Other ones are being implemented as we speak. We'll see some of that benefit grow as the year progresses.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

These improvements are on top of the reductions we made in the network alignment initiative. I think the team has done a great job in reducing empty repositioning costs, which were down 17% year-over-year in the quarter. We have also been reducing insurance expense. The team's done a great job in reducing accident frequency and severity. That has been a tailwind as well.

Bruce Chan (Analyst)

Okay. That's super helpful, caller. Maybe just for the follow-up, looking for some updates on EASO in terms of business trends. I know you mentioned that the Mexican volumes there are pretty strong. Any evidence of sourcing shifts there yet? If you think about M&A, we've talked about that a lot in the past, but specific to Mexico, do you feel like there's still opportunity to kind of fortify your presence there? Or do you think that you're pretty well built out?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. I would say EASO has been a fantastic joint venture, and we've been off to a great start. Our volumes were about 4x on a year-over-year basis, and we're cross-selling really well. Had some significant opportunities we're working on with our rail partners. It is very exciting. We have seen erratic shipping patterns with some of the news around tariffs being on and off. I think the more we get clarity there, the better. For the time being, most of our customers are back to normal shipping, and we're seeing increases in volume just on an organic basis, even before some of the cross-selling and obviously just the upside from having EASO in our numbers. We are continuing to look at acquisition opportunities. We have a really good pipeline right now, some really interesting opportunities.

I do think adding more solutions to support our customers in Mexico over time will be the right approach. We are certainly going to be opportunistic within that. We also have a lot of interesting opportunities in the space right now that will help us continue to build scale and differentiation in the existing service line. A lot of good opportunities.

Bruce Chan (Analyst)

That's great. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from the line of Uday Khanapurkar with TD Cowen.

Uday Khanapurkar (Analyst)

Hi, thanks. This is Uday on for Jason Seidl. I guess just one on surcharges. I guess your guide originally called for modest peak season surcharges, kind of preempting the pull forward. Are we still expecting that kind of in the base case? Maybe secondly, on the high end, are you assuming we see surcharges maybe earlier in the year than usual if this air pocket kind of gives way to a big influx?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Sure. Yeah. This is Kevin. I'll take that one. To answer the question on surcharges, the base case, there is none incorporated in the base case. Certainly, in the full case, yes, surcharges are contemplated, not to the level that we saw last year of $5.5 million. The timing of it is really in question. I think that's really one of the big things that is unknown at this time. Depending on when, if tariffs change, or, as Phil spoke about earlier, if that restocking really comes at a certain time, that is probably when we would see the surcharges. Without knowing what's going to happen with tariffs, it's really hard to predict when that would happen.

Uday Khanapurkar (Analyst)

Okay. That's pretty helpful. Maybe just another clarification. I mean, you said it was advantageous that a big chunk of bid got pulled into 1Q. Is that indicating that the intermodal pricing environment sort of deteriorated into 2Q and that we need some kind of stabilization in the second half to get to the flat year-on-year?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

No. No. Yeah. No. I think what we were seeing at the initial onset of this season was more aggressive truckload pricing and trying to push rates up. And intermodal was remaining similar to what we talked about, taking some rate in head hauls, but still very aggressive in back hauls. What we've seen now in the second portion of this season is just more truckload competition. Not really any change in the intermodal space. It's been more, or I guess less, opportunities for near-term conversion, just given some of the pricing that we're seeing from truckload carriers. But we're still winning in the market. I mean, we have a really good spread versus truck right now, around 30% in aggregate. And we have a really good value proposition with service.

I think the other thing is our customers are recognizing that if the consumer holds, there is going to be some significant shipping demand in the back half. They want to make sure they're locking in that capacity. Intermodal is obviously a good opportunity, one, to reduce costs in the supply chain, but two, make sure they're locking in capacity if there's a surge.

Uday Khanapurkar (Analyst)

Okay. That's great. Maybe if I can squeeze one on dedicated. I mean, how many bid seasons do you think it'll take to kind of get rates to kind of the previous high watermarks, the previous cycle? Any thoughts on that?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. Dedicated is multi-year contracts. We are constantly having renewals every year. Right now, it is a little bit more competitive with one-way. The rates are typically based off of driver pay with a fixed and variable portion. While it has been somewhat more aggressive, we are still doing a really good job on renewals, and we have done a lot of self-help on controlling costs and improving our operating performance, which is really supporting those improved margins on a year-over-year basis. We feel as though there are still opportunities regardless of what is going on with rate. We will constantly, every year, be renewing contracts. If wages are going up, we will be taking rates up and vice versa. Right now, obviously a competitive environment, but we are holding our own really well with strong renewals, strong service levels.

We are being proactive with our customers and identifying efficiency opportunities.

Uday Khanapurkar (Analyst)

All right. Thanks for the time.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Jonathan Chappell of Evercore ISI.

Jonathan Chappell (Senior Managing Director)

Thank you. Good afternoon. Kevin, just trying to put a pin on some of these things, which I understand are difficult to put a pin on, just given the uncertainty. But in the guidance in February, looking for high single-digit intermodal volume growth and low single-digit pricing increases. Given what you said for the midpoint today, volume decreases in the second half of 2Q, return to directional seasonality, ITS pricing flat for the rest of the year. What would that translate to for full-year intermodal volume growth and pricing?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. Thank you, Jonathan, for the question. Yeah. We're not, due to the varying scenarios that we really came up with and the uncertainty, we're not providing full-year forecasted volume numbers at this time. Like you said, we do anticipate a slowdown here in the second half of this quarter. Just without having some visibility into when that whiplash could come back and how strong that is, we're not providing those amounts this time.

Jonathan Chappell (Senior Managing Director)

Okay. That makes sense. On the pricing side, if it were to be flat from today, would that still be positive year-over-year in the second half, or would that be kind of closer to flat year-over-year?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. It'd be pretty close to flat for year-over-year. As Phil said, we do have good visibility to that with the bid being pulled forward. It will be dependent on how the mix ends up being. That is, again, making sure how compliant customers are with what they're telling us and sticking to their actual guide of rate that they originally projected.

Jonathan Chappell (Senior Managing Director)

Okay. That makes sense. One just quick last follow-up. Again, in February, you were looking for a normalization of incentive comp, which I think you had expected to be a headwind. You talked about all the great things you're doing on the cost side. Is that dialed down a bit as well, or do you still kind of expect the same incentive comp headwind year-over-year 2025 versus 2024?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. I think overall, we still expect some headwind there. It is being muted a little bit now with the change in the actual headcount itself.

Jonathan Chappell (Senior Managing Director)

Got it. Appreciate it, Kevin. Thank you.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Brian Ossenbeck of JPMorgan.

Brian Ossenbeck (Managing Director)

Hey, afternoon. Thanks for taking the question. Maybe just a broader question on the intermodal network and the utilization of it, and sort of the balance overall. It sounded like you had some pretty good reduction in empty repositioning costs, but maybe you can elaborate a little bit more on that. Do you still see pockets that are maybe a little bit less dense than you would like, or were you able to address those during bid season?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. Yeah. No, we are pleased with the progress on empty repos, even with that January pull forward of freight, reducing repo costs 17%. We felt like it was a really good outcome for us. That was due to those bid wins and creating better balance and velocity. We are pleased with that. We think we have continued to execute well in bids on the targeted lane. We will likely see a step down just with the unknown of how far West Coast volumes drop with this import air pocket. We will see another step down just due to less demand off the West Coast. I think we are controlling what we can control. Long term, you still want to be filling in those back haul lanes. We have done a good job with that.

The growth in the East is going to continue to create more balance and velocity there. Turn times in total, we're about 4% better on a year-over-year basis. We're pleased with that as well. We're getting more out of what we have on the street. We need to keep that momentum. Yeah, it's about continuing to win in the right lanes, and we're going out and executing on that.

Brian Ossenbeck (Managing Director)

It sounds like rail service is performing pretty well despite the volatility and the uncertainty, based on the comments on turn times. How is that translating to truckload conversion? It sounds like the spread is pretty favorable, but I'm assuming rail service is a big part of that conversation, too.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Absolutely. Rail service has been really phenomenal and resilient. Both of our partners are performing very well. I think as you think about what could potentially happen with more of a surge in import demand, I feel far more confident in our ability to manage that surge as an intermodal network than we were in the past, just given the resilience of the operating models of our rail partners. We are excited about that. Same with us. I think we have certainly learned a lot through the last few years and built more resilience into our service product as well. We feel very good about managing that for our customers. Once again, rail service has been really strong.

Brian Ossenbeck (Managing Director)

Last follow-up on the same sort of topic. What do you feel about stacked boxes and where they are, given we have seen some pretty big differences in the growth in different regions? I guess maybe an update in terms of just general positioning for boxes, other equipment in DRE, and what's the current percentage stacked? If you can give that. Thanks.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. Yeah. We have somewhere around approximately 20-25% of our boxes stacked at this moment in time. We think we have about 35% incremental capacity before we'd have to really put any capital into containers. We have a long way to go. We did improve our in-source DRE percentage by about 400 basis points sequentially. We've done a really nice job here in the second quarter thus far. We should see another step up on in-source DRE percentage. We're doing targeted hiring, but really just getting more utility out of our existing team. We feel good about the momentum there. I think we have plenty of capacity. On the drayage, on the street, we're doing a really good job. A lot of good work by the team.

Brian Ossenbeck (Managing Director)

Okay. Thank you, Phil. Appreciate it.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Thomas Wadewitz of UBS.

Thomas Wadewitz (Analyst)

Yeah. Good afternoon. Wanted to ask you, I know there's not a lot of visibility on volume, right? And you kind of gave us some of the parameters for how to think about that or high level. If we said, "Well, for 2Q and kind of sequentially," what's your kind of base case for 2Q intermodal volumes versus 1Q? April sounds like it looked pretty good, but you think full quarter is down or maybe kind of flat, factoring in some softening later in the quarter? How would you think about that?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. So I think it's a little unclear what the drop will be in the timing of it. If we're still plenty being transloaded and still in warehouses, that's going to delay that drop. Once again, we haven't seen it in our numbers yet. If it's three weeks out, I would tell you we're still anticipating volumes being up. If it's in the next two weeks, then that could vary. At this point, I would tell you we're still anticipating volume growth for the quarter. It really does depend on how large that drop is and what the timing is as well.

Thomas Wadewitz (Analyst)

Okay. And so volume growth sequentially or year-over-year?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

I would say year-over-year. Sequentially is probably unlikely, I would guess. Once again, hard to know. If we're in the second week of June and we still have product flowing, then we're going to be up. I think at the same time, we tried to give an indication of the exposure we have to China imports. I think our customers have diversified their supply chains. If 25% of our West Coast volumes are port-related and 30% of that is China, it shouldn't be an outsized impact. We have done really well with growth in Mexico and growth in the local East. Those should be some offsets to that import demand drop.

Thomas Wadewitz (Analyst)

Right. Okay. Wanted to also ask you a bit about how you're thinking about ITS and logistics operating margins looking forward. Do you think you think kind of stable? I mean, I know 2Q's got the wrinkle with some weakening in volume. How do you think about where we go from kind of 2.7 and 5.7 in 1Q, and what might be some key levers to potentially see improvement off the 1Q level?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Sure. This is Kevin. We do not provide quarterly guidance on this. What I will tell you is, again, it depends on that timing and if there is that falloff. Without that, we would expect to see the directional normal seasonal increases that you would see in third and fourth quarter for both ITS and for logistics. I think right now, second quarter is a little bit more up in the air. If there really is the falloff that everyone's talking about with the imports, then that may be sequentially down.

Thomas Wadewitz (Analyst)

Okay. So probably versus 1Q, some improvement in second half, but less clear for 2Q?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Again, those cost items that we talked about, the $40 million of different projects that we have, they're going to be kicking in. I think we'll be able to help even if there is some muted volume in the second half, especially maybe the beginning of July.

Thomas Wadewitz (Analyst)

Okay. Maybe one last one, and I'll hand it off. What do you think about kind of the key lever for intermodal margin improvement? You used to run at a lot higher level. I feel like it's just been the big weight on truckload and intermodal has just been excess capacity and difficulty getting rate. Is that really the thing? You just got to get a stronger rate environment, and then that intermodal margin improves a fair bit? What's kind of the key lever if you look a little further out?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. This is Phil. I mean, I do not really recall when we were running at a much higher margin. I think we have actually done a great job improving the trough-to-trough margin profile and actually more than doubling it. So I feel like we have actually done a great job. We did run higher in COVID when our boxes were being used for storage. Yeah, I guess that would be the time where it was higher. At the same time, I think we do need more velocity in the network. That is priority one. We need to continue to insource more drayage, which right now we are running over 80%. We have got our chassis programs in place. We have got variable rate in our rail contracts. Yes, I mean, I still think mid-cycle, this is a mid-single-digit operating margin business in that 5%-6% range.

As you get to the peak of a cycle, it could be much higher than that. Demand would certainly help. I think we've done a really good job controlling what we can control and improving the margins of the business. Yeah. Certainly, price moves a lever easier than volume does. That day is going to come. I think we're ready for that growth opportunity.

Thomas Wadewitz (Analyst)

Okay. All right. Makes sense. Thanks for the time.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Christopher Kuhn of the Benchmark Company.

Christopher Kuhn (Analyst)

Yeah. Hi. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions, guys. Appreciate it. Can we just go back to the logistics margins? I mean, they were up 70 basis points. The brokerage business still seems like a pretty big drag on that. I mean, are the other businesses within that improving margins, or is that all just the actions you took last year? What is the underlying margin in that business now that you've done a pretty good job despite the brokerage being a drag?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. Thank you for the question. Yeah. We do agree. We think we've done a very nice job improving the margins. And 70 basis points in this environment was pretty strong. If you look at it on a year-over-year basis, there was a drag from the brokerage offsetting some of the improvements we made, in particular in the consolidation business, where we've done a much better job on managing our labor expenses, improving customer retention levels, improving service, and then obviously aligning our space to our needs. We have some upside for growth, and that should certainly be help with some of the storage needs of our customers. Yes, we're continuing to drive improvements in our managed transportation business and final mile as well as in warehousing. I think on the brokerage, it has been a headwind. We have done a nice job reducing our negative margin loads.

It is down over 200 basis points in the quarter. Our productivity continues to improve. But with the limited stock market opportunities that have been out there, it has kind of kept a lid on the margin profile, although we are still profitable within that segment. No, I appreciate the question. I think we are doing a good job managing our costs there, but also bringing on nice new profitable wins, and see more margin upside ahead.

Christopher Kuhn (Analyst)

Yeah. No, that's helpful. Just a last comment. We haven't heard that maybe some shippers are keeping inventory in containers. I don't know if you're seeing that, but just curious as to whether that might be something you might see in the next quarter or two.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

We have not seen that yet. I think there may be some customers who overdo it on full forward. We have not seen it at that level yet, but certainly something we will watch. We have not seen that at this time.

Christopher Kuhn (Analyst)

Appreciate it. Thanks.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Our last question comes from David Zazula of Barclays.

David Zazula (Analyst)

Hey. Thanks for taking my question. Kevin noticed the lowering of the CapEx guide. I wonder if you could give some color on that. I think you'd said you already were not putting anything into containers this year. So what are you cutting? What areas are you kind of looking at to trim down the CapEx for the year?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Sure. Yes. Thank you for the question. Yeah. The changes in the CapEx, as you noted, went from $50 million-$70 million was the original. We're now down to $40 million-$50 million. It really reflects less fleet investment and steady upgrades in this environment. We're continuing to have no additional container investments. No change on our IT front. The projects that we had anticipated, we're still planning on it and moving forward with. Really, one of the things that we were able to do is really find some solutions to be able to use some of our equipment down in Mexico. That was an opportunity that allowed us to decrease that spend as well.

David Zazula (Analyst)

Awesome. On dedicated customer retention, I mean, you mentioned it is an issue, and I think it had been an issue in the past. Is it something that is accelerating? Is it something you're more concerned about now in the back half? Is this something that, due to the unstable environment, it's harder to get customers to resign contracts?

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Yeah. This is Phil. I think the sites that we lost were pretty small and mostly turned over to one-way truckload. Our retention levels are still around 90%. If you look at just on a contract basis, another % of revenue would be even higher than that just given its smaller sites. We feel as though we're in a good spot. We're providing really good service levels and being proactive on identifying efficiency opportunities. As I mentioned, we have some new onboardings we're bringing on with actually some new and existing customers. I think we're doing a good job managing that business. We have good operational controls. We just need to continue to execute, and we'll be in good shape. I think when you look down the road, this is going to be an opportunity for growth.

When those one-way rates change, we're going to be able to pounce back on with our dedicated solutions and hopefully win some contracts that way.

David Zazula (Analyst)

With you bringing in some new customers or additional volume with the additional customers, is the end market profile of dedicated changing at all? Are there some types of customers where it's easier to get them to look at dedicated now versus a year ago or two years ago?

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Yeah. Most of our dedicated business is retail-centric. We also have a strong, actually, industrial set of customers and a few consumer products as well. The new wins are mostly in the retail and consumer side, with companies that are performing very well through this turbulence in global trade and see a need to lock in high service capacity. The wins are in areas where we have density. Our ability to surge with them should be pretty strong. We feel good wins and good network lanes with good customers.

David Zazula (Analyst)

Thanks, Kevin. Thanks, Phil. Appreciate it.

Kevin Beth (CFO and Treasurer)

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

I would now like to turn the conference back to Phil Yeager for closing remarks.

Phil Yeager (President, CEO, and Vice Chairman)

Great. Thank you, everybody, for joining our first quarter earnings call this morning or this afternoon. As always, Kevin and I are available for any questions you might have. Thank you, and have a good evening.

Operator (participant)

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call with the Hub Group. Thank you for joining. You may now disconnect.