Expeditors Air Freight Surges 49 Percent

April expansion outpaces ocean growth amid “pricing sensitivity” in shipping

Expeditors International of Washington says its air freight tonnage soared 49 percent in April, growing faster than the 18 percent gain in the freight forwarder’s ocean volume.

Both figures marked the faster year-over-year expansion than the Seattle-based company saw in the first quarter of 2010, although Expeditors maintained a cautious view of the recovery from last year’s global economic meltdown.

“In the current state of the economy, we think things are still too fragile and the margin of error too small to create strategies predicated on our ability to divine the future,” Expeditors said in a response to investor questions filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Expeditors did not give detailed volume figures on its forwarding but noted air freight, the largest part of its business has been growing more rapidly over the depressed figures in the early part of 2009.

Air freight tonnage grew 40 percent in the first quarter, the company said, before the 49 percent surge in April. Ocean volume was up 14 percent in the first three months of the year, and then jumped 18 percent in April.

Expeditors said “pricing sensitivity” progressed through the first quarter in both air and ocean markets with space still tight after capacity cuts last year. “The ocean capacity is much more problematic at this point … but air freight struggles with capacity issues, causing a rather healthy charter market to emerge,” the company said.

(Source:www.joc.com)