Energy & Industrials News by GLG Council Members

Overall truck production is down due to significant slowing in the economy and an uncertain future. The lack of available credit is also multiplying the effect of the economy. Until the economy improves I do not expect truck production to improve.

BASF will  close 80 factories as auto, textile and construction companies reduce orders.The company will force 20,000 employees to work short hours. BASF said demand dropped significantly in early November as world economies slumped. BASF abandoned plans of matching 2007 profits. Chemical companies spent more than $200 billion on acquisitions during the past two years. CEO Hambrecht had already...

Some efforts so far by government and industry could aid in ending the dry-bulk decline. We could begin to see the effect of these efforts as early as the end of 1Q 2009.

As an Operations Supervisor for ABF Freight System, and later as the Production Manager for Diamond B Inc., I speak from experience when reporting that the random drug tests for drivers (at ABF) and the pre-employment drug screens (for Diamond B Inc.) were completed by sending the subjects to a licensed medical clinic where they were required to be tested in a gown. 

Large, complex projects that require years of forward planning won't be effected by temporary high's or low's in the price of crude oil.

The tourism business is very big, frequently it is cited as employing one in sixteen people globally. This would make it one of the world's largest employers.

Truck registrations are important to contrast against freight predictions for planning purposes by shippers, transport companies, industry suppliers, investors and other interested parties. These numbers tell how the trucking companies are planning for the near future. Last month, we authored an article looking at vastly lowered truck build forecasts. This is a look at reality…

  A change of operations regarding cost-cutting moves at the Yellow, Roadway and USF units of YRC Worldwide has been formally approved by the Teamsters union.   More such changes are coming as YRCW stock drops to $1.20 per share, a 90 percent drop in a year and its lowest intraday trading price since at least 1982.   YRC is trying to close as many as 150 terminals formerly operated...

  The Department of Transportation has decided to make it optional, rather than mandatory, for employers to require transportation workers be directly observed while providing urine specimens.   This is a victory for common sense. And probably for safety as well.   Talk about getting the government out of our bedroom! How about keeping it how of our bathrooms as well?

Public perception that the waste industry is committed to being "green" It shows that at the lower levels of management the ideas and concerns with the environment are  not held as highly as they should. Wasted fuel consumption