Cass Information Systems and Avondale Partners have created the Cass Intermodal Linehaul Index that the companies said accurately measures changes in U.S. domestic per-mile intermodal rates. It does this by removing the effects of fuel and accessorial costs and focusing solely on the linehaul component of total intermodal costs, they said.
As it has done with the Cass Truckload Linehaul Index, Avondale Partners will factor the intermodal data into in-depth market analyses on the transportation sector, which it publishes regularly to its investor client base.
“As far as we’re aware, this is the only intermodal pricing index available,” according to Donald Broughton, managing director and senior equity analyst, transportation.
“Cass aggregates transportation expense data for millions of U.S. shipments every month. This logistics data generates a wealth of business intelligence that is meaningful and valuable,” said John Pickering, COO, Cass Transportation Information Services division. “Like our other transportation indexes, we expect our intermodal index to be closely watched by shippers, industry analysts and other market watchers.”
Cass has been publishing the Cass Freight Index since 1990 and has more recently begun publishing mode-specific data. Cass logistics data products also include Cass Benchmark Data Services, allowing shippers to compare their costs to industry averages for truckload, LTL, rail and intermodal, and within geographic and weight constraints.
The Cass Intermodal Linehaul Index is based on per-mile pricing as of January 2005. Using a base value of 100, the Index for December registered a value of 102.3, which reflects a 1.9% increase in rates year over year. In comparison, truckload rates in December showed a gain of 8.6% from the prior year.
