J.B. Hunt eyeing at least $100 million in cost cuts

The leaders of J.B. Hunt Transport Services identified more than $100 million in cost savings—roughly 1% of the company’s total 2024 operating expenses—as the company battles persistent inflationary pressures in various parts of its business.

Speaking after Arkansas-based J.B. Hunt, No. 4 on the FleetOwner 500 list of for-hire carriers, reported second-quarter results, President and CEO Shelley Simpson and her team said they focused their efforts on productivity, asset utilization, and technology, and expect that most of the savings will be generated in 2026 rather than later this year.

“We want to point our people from doing work that we think we can automate and become more efficient in growing our business,” Simpson said on a July 15 conference call with analysts and investors. “That’s our first $100 million; we’ll have more updates from there.”

Three months ago, on J.B. Hunt’s first-quarter earnings call, Simpson said her team might target more cost cuts and try to improve the company’s efficiency in the face of a trucking market that was “changing by the day or the tweet of the moment.” That market hasn’t notably improved: Hours before J.B. Hunt reported results, AFS Logistics and TD Cowen said the latest reading for their freight index shows “a freight market in stasis, mired in prolonged low demand as businesses wait to see how evolving trade policies unfold.”

See also: How the freight recession made trucking less profitable

Nevertheless, J.B. Hunt continues to grapple with rising costs. Brad Delco, senior vice president of finance, told analysts the company’s second-quarter casualty insurance, claims, and group medical costs were $21 million higher than in the prior-year period—while the company’s overall operating expenses were up $8 million. During the quarter, personnel and insurance costs—executives also cited rising driver wages—were 30.8% of revenue, up from 29.9% in the spring of 2024.

J.B. Hunt’s total revenues for the quarter were a little more than $2.9 billion, flat from the same period of 2024. Net income fell 5% to nearly $129 million while operating profits were down 4% to $197 million.

Intermodal operations, which account for roughly half of J.B. Hunt’s top line and operating profits, grew slightly during the second quarter to $1.44 billion but saw operating income slip 4% from a year earlier. Darren Field, president of intermodal, said his team’s overall book of business did get slightly better pricing during the quarter, but still “underperformed our expectations.”

Among the company’s other business units, dedicated services remained flat year over year at nearly $850 million, while final-mile revenues declined 10% to $211 million, and truckload sales increased 5% to $177 million.

Shares of J.B. Hunt (Ticker: JBHT) fell nearly 2% after hours July 15, a move that came on the heels of giving up more than 2% in the regular session, which they closed at $148.86. Over the past six months, they have lost about 20% of their value, a slide that has cut the company’s market capitalization to about $14.8 billion.