Sep 14, 2026 earnings call — Domestic freight rebound and tech-led growth
Reported $10.4 million in adjusted EBITDA for the fourth fiscal quarter.
Revenue $0.3B (est $0.2B) · EPS $0.15 (est $0.07)
Key quotes
"If these trends continue, we believe they support a broad-based and durable recovery for the domestic freight market."
"This complexity together with a period of elevated IEEPA-related filing activity across the industry has continued to drive demand for our customs brokerage expertise as customers rely on experienced partners to navigate the evolving tariff structure."
"Navegate is beginning to prove itself out as a catalyst for growth, providing customers with better visibility and tools to manage complex supply chains with one of our enterprise customers now actively managing over 1,400 vendors using the platform."
Analyst Q&A 4
truck and rail shipping trends, fuel pass-through
Q (Ryan Meyers · Lake Street Capital): He asked what improvements they have seen since the quarter end and when those trends will show up in the financials. He also asked how higher fuel costs affect their ability to pass costs to customers.
A: Management said the recent improvement is focused on over-the-road truck brokerage and related intermodal moves, driven by capacity leaving the market and higher fuel. They said the market pivot began in late May to early June so only about one month of that improvement was in the quarter, and they expect trends to continue into the September quarter and beyond. On fuel, they said fuel is generally a pass-through with only modest lags and that they can pass increasing fuel costs to customers relatively quickly.
"So this kind of market pivot or evolution really didn't start happening until late May, early June." — Bohn Crain (CEO)
how durable freight demand is
Q (Elliot Alper · TD Cowen): He asked how structural the recent market shifts are and what to expect in the back half, including China bookings and Canada cross-border. He also asked about air freight pull-forward and disaster relief, and how Navegate is priced and affects margins.
A: Management said they have a broad, diversified platform and that most businesses are trending up, with domestic freight appearing to set up for a more durable recovery. They noted steamship lines are managing capacity with blank sailings to support ocean prices and that data center activity is tightening capacity broadly, including airfreight. On air freight, disaster relief was meaningful but "even without it, we still would have been up year-over-year," and for Navegate they said pricing can be embedded in transportation or billed separately, but it is mainly viewed as a growth and customer-stickiness catalyst rather than a pure margin lever.
"But even without it, we still would have been up year-over-year." — Bohn Crain (CEO)
growth outlook, tax, brokerage rules, Navegate
Q (Jeffrey Kauffman · Citizens Bank): He asked how to think about revenue growth into 2027 given volatile seasonality and a big Q4, and how to model growth versus gross margin. He also asked about the big difference in the Q4 tax rate, the Montgomery brokerage ruling impact, and how Navegate should be modeled for margins.
A: Management said model modestly and focus more on gross margin dollars than top-line revenue because fuel pass-throughs can distort revenue. They said Q4 organic was up about 8% and trends improved late in the quarter, carrying into the next quarter, and that the tax-rate swing was driven by a change from the "One Big Beautiful Bill" allowing previously capitalized internal software costs to be captured in Q4. On brokerage, they said you need a well-documented carrier vetting process, they had such a process in place before the ruling, and they are taking the issue very seriously. On Navegate, they said to think of it primarily as a revenue and growth driver rather than as adding basis points to margin.
"That was the One Big Beautiful Bill where it allowed us beginning in January, and we really kind of captured that in the Q4 to take items that were previously capitalized as far as internal software." — Todd Macomber (CFO)
Navegate pipeline, data centers, acquisition plans
Q (Michael Vermut · Newland Capital): He asked about the pipeline for landing enterprise customers on Navegate and how that could accelerate growth over 2–3 years. He also asked how much business comes from data centers and about the acquisition market and capital use.
A: Management said they do not have a crisp quantification yet but see amplification: vendors on the Navegate platform can become enterprise customers themselves and sometimes request the solution, which creates upside. They said Navegate plus Radiant’s 100-plus forwarding locations gives a virtual sales organization to activate customers, and on data centers they said they have exposure but it is not a large driver of current financial performance. On acquisitions, they said the market has many sellers, they will remain disciplined but aspire to be acquisitive, and they have "a lot of dry powder and an unlevered balance sheet" to pursue sensible opportunities.
"We've always been good allocators of capital, but we've got a lot of dry powder and an unlevered balance sheet, and we're looking for opportunities and ways that make sense to put that capital to work." — Bohn Crain (CEO)