Signs of a Marten turnaround, but trucker’s numbers mostly lower

The corporate earnings of Marten Transport released Thursday do not show a company that has benefitted yet from a stronger freight market, year-on-year or sequentially.

For example, its company-wide operating ratio (OR) net of fuel was 99.1%. That showed a deterioration from 97.5% in the fourth quarter of 2025 and was worse sequentially than 97% in the first quarter of 2025.

The company’s operating income was $1.6 million in the first three months of this year. A year ago, it was $5.9 million. Fourth quarter 2025 operating income was $4.6 million.

For Marten’s (NASDAQ: MRTN) truckload segment, the OR net of fuel in the first quarter of 2026 was 101.1%. A year ago it was 100.3%; in the fourth quarter of 2025 it was 99.1%.

The dedicated segment’s OR net of fuel of 96.9% was 470 basis points worse than the 92.2% recorded a year ago. It was also a sequential deterioration from the 94.6% recorded in the final three months of 2025.

There were some positive numbers. The average revenue net of fuel per tractor per week in the Truckload segment was $4,425 compared to $4,196 a year ago . It was also improved sequentially from $4,200 in the fourth quarter of 2025.

A similar story played out in the dedicated segment, where the weekly figure of $3,909 was stronger than $3,846 a year earlier, and better than the $3,870 recorded in 2025’s fourth quarter.

Chairman and CEO Randolph Marten cited those figures as a positive in his prepared comments released in conjunction with the earnings.

“Our people drove sequential increases in our revenue per tractor within our truckload and dedicated operations each of the last two quarters,” he said.

But Marten said the impact from the higher revenue per truck “was more than offset by the prolonged severe winter storms.”

Diesel prices cited

But unusual in trucking recent earnings reports, where fuel surcharges do a strong job of shifting fuel prices to shippers and away from carriers and are rarely mentioned in earnings statements and calls, Marten also said the performance was negatively impacted by “the sharp spike in diesel prices in the first quarter.”

The brokerage segment turned in a weaker performance than a year ago as measured by OR. The first quarter of 2026 for brokerage reported an OR of 97.4% versus 93.5% a year ago. Brokerage in the first quarter of 2026 did outperform the fourth quarter of 2025, when its OR was 98%.

Similar performance at other truckload carriers

The decline in OR year-on-year was not unique for a truckload carrier in the first quarter. Knight Swift (NYSE: KNX), for example, reported an adjusted OR of 97% in the quarter, compared to 94.7% a year earlier. At Covenant Logistics (NYSE: CVLG), the OR came in at 98.0% compared to 97.2% a year ago.

But Heartland Express (NASDAQ: HTLD) saw its adjusted OR improve to 101.3% from 107.1% a year ago.

Marten does not hold an earnings call with analysts. In the prepared statement released in conjunction with the earnings, Marten chairman and CEO Randolph Marten signaled better days may be ahead.

“We believe that the freight market is in the early stages of recovery fueled by the current administration’s accelerating immigration enforcement clampdowns on multiple fronts — including noncompliant state licensing practices for non-domiciled commercial driver’s licenses, or CDL’s, English Language Proficiency enforcement, electronic logging device fraud, CDL mills and chameleon carriers,” he said. “These measures are structural changes to the freight market that have been and are expected to continue contracting capacity by removing noncompliant and unqualified drivers who never should have been driving in the first place.”

His other comments were not that much different than he and other freight executives could have said at any time during the past few years.

“Our earnings have been heavily pressured by the historic duration and depth of the freight market recession’s oversupply and weak demand, and the cumulative impact of inflationary operating costs, freight rate reductions and freight network disruptions,” Marten said.

Net income of 2 cents per share was down from 5 cents per share a year earlier. The fourth quarter of 2025 also saw a 5 cents per share net income.

SeekingAlpha reported that 2 cents per share recorded by Marten was in line with consensus forecasts.

Marten’s stock performance is higher across the board in three key measurements. For the 52 weeks, it’s up 13.3%, per Barchart. Over three months, the gain is 17.1%. And in the last month, Marten is up 16.4%.

But its closing price Thursday of $14.83 is well below prices that exceeded $23/share in late July 2023.

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