Latest news with #Nebraska-based
Yahoo
29-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
This railroad has 100 extra locomotives ready to handle a container surge
While U.S. logistics providers wait out the post-trade war lull in import shipments, BNSF Railway is setting up its network to handle an expected surge following a pause in tariffs between China and the United States. 'I guess probably the most overused words in logistics is this 'air pocket' that hit us the last couple of weeks,' said Jon Gabriel, group vice president, Consumer Products, for Omaha, Nebraska-based BNSF, in an interview. 'Now, we do have some line of sight on shipments that are coming our way, but not yet. But if you look at the bookings coming out of Asia, certainly you've seen kind of that V-shaped check mark.' It was several weeks after the tariff pause went into effect in May that the railroad started to feel the import air pocket. 'We're probably three to four weeks removed from starting to see things charged back up on the West Coast, LA-Long Beach, the Northwest Seaport Alliance [of Seattle and Tacoma],' Gabriel said. 'Post-Fourth of July, we think things will be busy. We're excited again to demonstrate that we're ready to move a lot of freight from the supply chain, just like we did in the first quarter.'The railroad has also used the import downturn to position itself for the coming recovery. 'We have more than 100 locomotives that we would call a 'surge fleet,' ready to go in the state of California alone, some 9 miles of locomotives,' Gabriel said. 'And we have a large quantity of railcars set up against traffic in California, Arizona and in Washington for the Pacific Northwest. We have also taken the opportunity to do some preventative maintenance, both on tracks and rolling stock, in pre-position against the West Coast. 'So again, we feel really good about our ability to quickly respond when traffic starts to make its way into the West Coast.' Gabriel compared the resumption to the period in 2024 after an early peak season caused by shippers frontloading to avoid East Coast port labor disruptions by the International Longshoremen's Association.'I think we went through both those on the West Coast with strong performance levels, moved a lot of freight, made a lot of capacity available.' Based on what he's hearing from supply chain partners and customers, 'we suspect we've already bottomed out; we've started to see what we call 'build,' not just in traffic that's sitting on the docks, or within earshot, of the West Coast, but not yet on a railcar. That has bottomed out and started to climb again. We have started to hear from our carriers that they have gone back to essentially full vessel utilization, meaning that for a couple of weeks, if there were still boats running, they just weren't full, and now the boats are full.' Gabriel described the initial build as 'the first little bit of a wave,' and said that based on new vessel capacity strings and other transit from Asia, the surge is probably three to four weeks away. 'We'll probably see a gradual decline and then a gradual increase, followed by a step-level increase, once all this new added vessel capacity gets to the West Coast,' he said. 'The capacity is coming back into the lane.' That would include major carriers Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd, which this week announced new direct service from Asia to the Port of Long Beach, but also smaller carriers such as CU Lines, seeing an opportunity in sharply rising rates. The China-based company is deploying five vessels of 2,400-2,800 twenty-foot equivalent units each from three Chinese ports to Long Beach. At the moment, Gabriel said BNSF intermodal volumes are modestly above year-ago levels, on lingering diversions away from the East Coast in late 2024 and frontloading in the first quarter by shippers looking to stay ahead of tariffs. 'It's nothing that we … feel like our network can't handle, offering considerably better transit service and experiences for our customers.' Gabriel said BNSF's network is performing at its best level since 2020, when volumes were depressed across the supply chain by the pandemic. While there are no pressure points on the network 'we do suspect that there could be some pull-forward of fourth-quarter demand to beat that August 12 [tariff pause] deadline.'Gabriel said BNSF's prior investments have helped it manage through the vagaries of the Trump administration's changing trade policy. The railroad in the past several years added 100 miles of new main track on its transcontinental route between Los Angeles and Chicago, for double-, triple- or quadruple-track configurations, to accommodate denser traffic when necessary. BNSF has also added more than 8,000 parking spaces at intermodal ramps across its network, the equivalent of one entire Alliance Intermodal Facility in Fort Worth, Texas, largest on the railroad. 'That's surge capacity for our network, and at the same time, we've added more production tracks so we can lift-on lift-off more traffic simultaneously,' Gabriel said. 'We haven't had a quote-unquote 'normal period' going back several years in the supply chain. If we recognize that's kind of a new state of life that we're in, hence, we've made all these resiliency, and I would say, recoverability, investments.' As for Chicago, the mid-American choke point for rail freight, Gabriel said BNSF has the most rail capacity of any Class I, operating a total of four facilities. Three are domestic intermodal, while the fourth is a major international rail terminal, outside Joliet, Illinois. BNSF has added on- and off-site parking throughout, and a three-year expansion project at Cicero, Illinois. has increased capacity by 30%. Manufacturing is starting to flex up in China even as companies look to diversify supply chains throughout the region rather than to North America. 'I think you saw a large movement of that during the Trump 1 tariffs in 2018,' said Gabriel. ''China Plus One' didn't necessarily mean China onshore to nearshore; there's certainly some of that, but really it was China to somewhere else in Southeast Asia, which bodes well to the West Coast and in our networks.' As for cross-border traffic with Mexico outside of automotive, Gabriel said, 'I wouldn't say that we've seen meaningful movement in nearshore activity, from a manufacturing standpoint. What we've really seen is modal conversion, and that's all we're targeting, just like we are stateside of highway traffic that's going cross-border.' Gabriel said BNSF isn't seeing much warehousing on the rails as was typical post-pandemic in 2021. 'Dwell has stayed really, really low, historically low levels. We haven't seen a lot of rolling storage on our network; the product has continued to leave our rail ramps in a relatively normal flow. Less than 12 hours for our truckload segment, 24 to 30 hours for international, somewhere in that two- to three-day morning [delivery].' That reflects well on supply chain partners, as well as the railroad. 'That tells you, if the supply chain is relatively intact and moving, there's deep, relatively good balance,' Gabriel said. 'Chassis drayage, drivers, warehouse capacity, all those elements, those underpinnings seem like they're holding up and more positioned to move traffic here throughout the next several months.' Subscribe to FreightWaves' Rail e-newsletter and get the latest insights on rail freight right in your inbox. Find more articles by Stuart Chirls joins railcar builder Greenbrier as chief commercial officer Norfolk Southern expands short line interchange improvement program Rail agenda steams up as short lines blitz Congress Coal extends surprising lead in weekly US rail traffic The post This railroad has 100 extra locomotives ready to handle a container surge appeared first on FreightWaves.
Yahoo
29-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
The top commercial contractors of 2025
This story was originally published on Construction Dive. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Construction Dive newsletter. New York City-based Turner Construction has once again retained its top spot as the No. 1 contractor in the country by revenue, according to Engineering News-Record's 2025 Top 400 Commercial Contractors list released last week. Reston, Virginia-based Bechtel reclaimed second place after Omaha, Nebraska-based Kiewit, which placed No. 3 this year, pushed it out of the runner-up slot last year. All three of the top contractors experienced some measure of revenue growth. Turner's 2024 revenue grew to $20.2 billion from $17.1 billion last year, while Bechtel grew to $15.9 billion from $12.9 billion. Kiewit generated $14 billion in 2024 compared to the prior year's $13.8 billion. In a large swing, Falls Church, Virginia-based HITT Contracting leapt up the rankings, jumping from the No. 26 slot last year into the No. 10 position on the back of a revenue increase of approximately $3 billion, according to the report. HITT credited the company's revenue jump with listening to, and evolving alongside, its clients, according to Kim Roy, the company's CEO. 'Over the past five years, we've expanded in key sectors with strong demand and long-term opportunities, such as mission critical, hospitality, healthcare, manufacturing and industrial,' Roy told Construction Dive via email. 'We also continue to grow alongside our long-time corporate and multifamily clients, who have been pivotal to HITT's success.' In addition to HITT, Atlanta-based Holder Construction also made a big leap, to the No. 15 slot from last year's position at No. 30. The company reported $7.7 billion in 2024 revenue, compared to $5 billion in 2023. The list comes as public builders have, for the most part, downplayed the effects that President Donald Trump's tariffs have had on their first quarter earnings performance. Since the rankings depend on 2024 revenue, it can be seen as a lagging indicator of performance, unaffected by tariffs, or even the Trump presidency. Other firms that jumped five spots or more in the top 50 include: Minneapolis-based Mortenson, up to No. 22 from No. 27. Concord, California-based Swinerton, up to No. 30 from No. 35. Tempe, Arizona-based Sundt Construction, up to No. 46 from No. 51. Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based Performance Contractors Inc., which landed at No. 47 despite being unranked last year. Columbus, Kansas-based Crossland Construction Co., up to No. 50 from No. 55. Builders that fell five or more spots in the top 50 include: Providence, Rhode Island-based Gilbane Building Co., which dropped from 11 to 17. St. Louis-based Arco Construction Cos., down to No. 29 from No. 17. Southfield, Michigan-based Barton Malow, down to No. 35 from No. 19. While the leapfrogging activity shows that there's always room at the top, there are red flags building in the construction industry as well. In April, project stress rose, and the private sector neared a multi-year high in abandonments, according to Cincinnati-based ConstructConnect. In addition, the Dodge Momentum Index grew 0.9% in April, a lower rate of growth compared to past months, mostly powered by work in data center projects. Without data centers, the DMI would've dropped 3%. At the same time, optimism remains. Construction backlog rose in April to its highest level since September 2023, particularly for builders with over $100 million in revenue. However, it's down year over year for contractors that made $30 million to $100 million in annual revenue. See the chart below for the top 10 commercial contractors on the list: Ranking Contractor 2024 Revenue 1 Turner Construction $20.2 billion 2 Bechtel $15.9 billion 3 Kiewit Corp. $14 billion 4 The Whiting-Turner Contracting Corp. $13.3 billion 5 MasTec $12.3 billion 6 STO Building Group $12 billion 7 Fluor $11.1 billion 8 DPR Construction $10.8 billion 9 McDermott International $8.9 billion 10 HITT Contracting $8.7 billion Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
27-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Bitcoin Wallet Firm Exodus Unveils Crypto Debit Card With Baanx
U.S.-listed Exodus Movement (EXOD), a self-custody wallet firm specializing in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, has unveiled an Exodus debit card in partnership with Baanx, a crypto card enabler that works with Mastercard and Visa. Through the Baanx partnership, Exodus users can spend their crypto on everyday purchases such as travel, online shopping, and anywhere Mastercard is accepted, the firms announced at the BTC Vegas conference on Tuesday. Bringing debit card functionality to self-custody crypto holders is a fast-growing subset of the digital assets space, attracting a range of popular platforms such as Ethereum wallet firm MetaMask, decentralized finance firm 1inch and most recently, Sam Altman's World Network. Beta testing of the virtual Exodus card begins at BTC Vegas, starting with the two major stablecoins, USDT and USDC, which users can instantly swap for bitcoin and other major cryptos inside the Exodus wallet. A wider rollout to the six million or so Exodus users will happen later this year, said Exodus CEO JP Richardson. 'If you consider there are 1.7 billion people who are unbanked out there, well now they don't need a bank account because they can use something like this,' Richardson said in an interview. Baanx chief commercial officer Simon Jones echoed this view: 'You are effectively saying that if you've got access to a mobile phone, you've got access to a range of basic financial services,' Jones said in an interview. 'Historically, wallets were very much focused around the custodial element with some swaps and trading. Now we are really seeing an evolution happen where your wallet is becoming your virtual account.' In December of 2024, Nebraska-based Exodus was given the greenlight to list on the NYSE American, the New York Stock Exchange's sibling market, not long after Donald Trump's election victory. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
San Francisco Chronicle
23-05-2025
- Business
- San Francisco Chronicle
Buckle: Fiscal Q1 Earnings Snapshot
KEARNEY, Neb. (AP) — KEARNEY, Neb. (AP) — Buckle Inc. (BKE) on Friday reported fiscal first-quarter earnings of $35.2 million. On a per-share basis, the Kearney, Nebraska-based company said it had profit of 70 cents. The teen clothing retailer posted revenue of $272.1 million in the period. Buckle shares have declined 18% since the beginning of the year. The stock has climbed 13% in the last 12 months. _____
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Buckle: Fiscal Q1 Earnings Snapshot
KEARNEY, Neb. (AP) — KEARNEY, Neb. (AP) — Buckle Inc. (BKE) on Friday reported fiscal first-quarter earnings of $35.2 million. On a per-share basis, the Kearney, Nebraska-based company said it had profit of 70 cents. The teen clothing retailer posted revenue of $272.1 million in the period. Buckle shares have declined 18% since the beginning of the year. The stock has climbed 13% in the last 12 months. _____ This story was generated by Automated Insights ( using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on BKE at
