Old Dominion Freight Line Inc
Old Dominion Freight Line, Inc. is one of the largest North American less-than-truckload (“LTL”) motor carriers and provides regional, inter-regional and national LTL services through a single integrated, union-free organization. Our service offerings, which include expedited transportation, are provided through an expansive network of service centers located throughout the continental United States. The Company also maintains strategic alliances with other carriers to provide LTL services throughout North America. In addition to its core LTL services, the Company offers a range of value-added services including container drayage, truckload brokerage and supply chain consulting.
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45.6% overvaluedOld Dominion Freight Line Inc (ODFL) — Q3 2016 Transcript
AI Call Summary AI-generated
The 30-second take
Old Dominion reported record revenue and profit despite shipping fewer goods. The overall economy remained weak, which hurt their volume, but they managed to keep prices stable and control costs effectively. This mattered because it showed the company could still perform well even when the broader market was soft.
Key numbers mentioned
- Revenue was $782.6 million for the third quarter.
- Operating ratio was 82.4% for the quarter.
- Earnings per diluted share were $1.03.
- LTL tons per day decreased by 1.3%.
- Cash flow from operations totaled $117.9 million for the quarter.
- Service centers totaled 226.
What management is worried about
- The soft economic environment is causing a decline in LTL volume.
- Declining volumes are causing a loss of freight density, which increases the operating ratio.
- Fringe benefit costs have increased and are expected to remain elevated in the fourth quarter.
- The company is seeing "choppiness" and volumes are "a little bit lighter in October" than expected.
What management is excited about
- The headwinds from declining fuel surcharges and non-LTL revenues have moderated.
- LTL revenue per hundredweight, excluding fuel surcharge, increased by 2.7%.
- Productivity improved, with tons per hour increasing by 5.9%.
- The company has plans for 35 to 40 additional service centers to increase density and market share.
- There is a solid opportunity to restore more favorable hours-of-service rules for drivers.
Analyst questions that hit hardest
- Scott Group (Wolfe Research) - Pace of market share gains: Management gave a long, contextual answer about past geographic expansion and YRC's historical losses, ultimately stating their rate of gain has slowed in the soft economy but they are positioned to benefit when it improves.
- Ravi Shanker (Morgan Stanley) - Future capital expenditure levels: The response was evasive, noting they had overestimated volume, are focused only on replacement for now, and will not disclose the number until January.
- Ari Rosa (Bank of America) - Competitor geographic expansion: Management responded defensively, stating the competitor "has their work cut out for them" against strong service competition and would struggle with profitability if they cut prices.
The quote that matters
To achieve these results, in a quarter where total tons declined... is a real tribute to the hard work... of our OD family of employees.
Earl Congdon — Executive Chairman
Sentiment vs. last quarter
Omit this section entirely.
Original transcript
Operator
Good morning and welcome to the Third Quarter 2016 Conference Call for Old Dominion Freight Line. Today’s call is being recorded and will be available for replay beginning today and through November 7th by dialing 719-457-0820. The replay passcode is 2072815. The replay may also be accessed through November 27th at the Company’s website. This conference call may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements among other regarding Old Dominion’s expected financial and operating performance. For this purpose, any statements made during this call that are not statements of historical fact may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. Without limiting the foregoing, the words believes, anticipates, plans, expects, and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. You are hereby cautioned that these statements may be affected by the important factors, among others, set forth in Old Dominion’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, and in this morning’s news release. And consequently, actual operations and results may differ materially from the results discussed in the forward-looking statements. The Company undertakes no obligation to update publicly any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. As a final note before we begin, we welcome your questions today, but ask, in fairness to all, that you limit yourself to just a couple of questions at a time before returning to the queue. Thank you for your cooperation. At this time, for opening remarks, I’d like to turn the conference over to the Company’s Executive Chairman, Mr. Earl Congdon. Please go ahead, sir.
Good morning. Thank you for joining us today for our third quarter conference call. With me this morning are David Congdon, Old Dominion’s Vice Chairman and CEO; and Adam Satterfield, our CFO. After some brief remarks, we’ll be glad to take your questions. We are pleased with the improvements in our overall results of the third quarter, although the environment remains challenging. We produced new company records for quarterly revenue, net income, and earnings per share. In addition, our 82.4 operating ratio was just 30 basis points short of our best operating ratio ever in the third quarter of last year. To achieve these results, in a quarter where total tons declined for the second consecutive quarter, and shipments declined for the first time in seven years, it is a real tribute to the hard work, innovation, and flexibility of our OD family of employees and also highlights the Company's long-term operating strength, which begins and ends with our commitment to providing superior customer service at a fair price. We have also maintained a steady investment in capacity and technology while most importantly continuing to invest in our people, which include providing the tools and training for them to be successful in their job, as well as a 3% wage increase that we awarded to our employees in September. I've experienced per share of challenging operating environments and have learned the importance of remembering that the economy will eventually get better. As a result, we are a company that focuses on the long-term. We have built Old Dominion with core operating philosophies that drive long-term success, and we are fortunate to have the financial strength to implement these customer-focused strategies throughout the economic cycle. Since our model has consistently outperformed our peers, in both good and bad environments, we continue to focus on executing our strategic plan and remain confident that we can increase our long-term market share, profitability, and shareholder value. So, thanks for joining us this morning. Now here is David Congdon to give you more details on the quarter.
Thanks, Earl, and good morning. As Earl mentioned, we did see slight improvement in our financial results for the third quarter and have several reasons to be encouraged as we enter the fourth quarter. To start off with, we continue to deliver superior service that our customers value with over 99% on-time deliveries and a cargo claim ratio of 0.28% in the third quarter. Our revenue increased slightly for the quarter primarily due to strong yield performance in a stable pricing environment. In addition, the headwinds that we faced in the first half of the year from the declining fuel surcharges and non-LTL revenues have moderated. Our non-LTL revenues declined by an average of $9.3 million for both the first and second quarters of 2016 as compared to the respective periods of 2015. The third quarter decrease was $6.4 million. This year-over-year decline should be further reduced in the fourth quarter as we fully cycle through the strategic changes made to our international freight forwarding and container drayage service that began in the second half of 2015. Our LTL revenue per hundredweight, excluding fuel surcharge, increased by 2.7% for both the second and third quarter. The increase in the third quarter felt stronger to us; however, as the 0.5% increase in weight per shipment and the 0.2% decrease in average length of haul both put downward pressure on this yield metric. We also saw good productivity improvement on the platform as tons per hour increased by 5.9% and shipments per hour increased by 4.7%. P&D metrics were flat for the third quarter and the line haul latent load average declined by 1.4%, as we continued to run schedules to meet customer service expectations. We are operating at very efficient levels. We have an opportunity to improve productivity in future periods, especially as our LTL weight per shipment increases. Offsetting these improvements, we saw a 1.3% decline in LTL tons for the core following a slight decline in the second quarter. We believe the decline in LTL volume continues to be more a function of the soft economic environment than anything else. The decline in volumes caused us to lose freight density, which contributed to the increase in our operating ratio for the quarter, despite otherwise excellent control over our variable cost. As I have said many times, long-term profitable growth requires four key ingredients: improvement in density, yields, and productivity, all within a positive economic environment. We can't control the economy. We will continue to focus on the disciplined execution of our strategic plan to provide the service at a fair price. We will continue to invest in capacity, technology, and people. We will continue to focus on further controlling our costs. Taking care of our customers and employees reflects our long-term experience that shows we are positioned to keep the promises we make to our customers and reinforce that they make to their customers every day. We also know from experience that the consistent execution of our strategic plan will help us win additional market share leading to long-term profitable growth and an increase in shareholder value. Thanks for joining us today. And now, Adam will review our financial results for the third quarter in greater detail.
Thank you, David, and good morning. Old Dominion’s revenue was a company record $782.6 million for the third quarter of 2016, which is a 0.4% increase from last year. Our operating ratio was 82.4%, which was a 30-basis point increase over the third quarter of 2015. Earnings per diluted share were $1.03, which reflects a 4% increase from the $0.99 earnings per share in the third quarter of last year. The increase in revenue for the third quarter reflects an increase in LTL revenue that was partially offset by the $6.4 million decline in non-LTL revenue. LTL per hundredweight increased by 2.5% for the quarter and increased by 2.7% when excluding fuel surcharges, as the pricing environment has remained stable. We implemented our general rate increase on tariff business effective September 26th, and we will continue to target rate increases on our contractual accounts to average between 3% to 4% to offset our own cost inflation. LTL tons per day decreased by 1.3% as compared to the third quarter of 2015. Our LTL shipments per day decreased by 1.8%, the first such decrease into the fourth quarter since 2009, while our LTL weight per shipment increased by 0.5%, the first increase into the fourth quarter since 2014. On a sequential basis, our LTL tons per day for the third quarter increased by 1.2% as compared to the second quarter of 2016. This was slightly below our 10-year average sequential trend, which is a 1.9% increase. Month-to-date for October, our LTL revenue per day has increased slightly on a year-over-year basis as we continue to see good yield performance. This was offset by a 1.8% decrease in LTL tons per day, however. Our operating ratio for the third quarter of 2016 increased by 30 basis points as compared to the third quarter of 2015. As we have discussed in the past couple of quarters, the increase in our operating ratio was primarily caused by the deleveraging effect on our fixed cost resulting from the flatness in our revenue. In particular, depreciation and amortization cost increased by 90 basis points as a percent of revenue in the third quarter. These costs are a result of the long-term investments we have made in real estate, equipment, and information technology. On the positive side, we were once again pleased with the improvement in our variable operating cost as a percent of revenue. While these costs improved in the aggregate, our salaries, wages, and benefits did increase for the third quarter, primarily due to increased fringe benefit costs and general wage inflation, as the average number of our full-time employees decreased by 1.4% for the quarter. As anticipated, our fringe benefit cost increased to 34.4% of salaries and wages from 32.0% for the third quarter of 2015, and we expect these costs to remain elevated again in the fourth quarter. Old Dominion’s cash flow from operations totaled $117.9 million for the third quarter and $410.1 million for the first nine months of 2016. Capital expenditures were $55.6 million for the quarter and $351.1 million for the first nine months of 2016, which is approximately 87% of the $405 million estimate for the year. We repurchased $34.3 million of our common stock during the third quarter and $190 million in the first nine months of 2016. These purchases left us with $211.3 million available for purchase under our current $250 million repurchase program. Our effective tax rate for the third quarter was 37.2% compared to 38.4% for the third quarter of last year due to several discrete tax adjustments. We expect the effective tax rate to be 38.4% again in the fourth quarter. This concludes our prepared remarks this morning. Operator, we’ll be happy to open the floor for questions at this time.
Operator
Thank you. We have a question from Jason Sidel. Your line is open.
Quick question about the weight per shipment, I mean, I think it's a good sign right that we've seen it pickup for the first time since the fourth quarter of 2004. But I think in our own comments, you mentioned that we're still seeing a very challenging market. Is it challenging, but getting slightly better? I am trying to figure out why the weight per shipment would have picked up because one other competitor that reported thus far had good results, but their weight per shipment trended down again as well?
Sequentially, it's staying about the same; it's just that we're finally lapping over a period last year where, if you recall, it was coming down throughout the year and then stabilized in the back half of the year. So, the weight per shipment in the third quarter was 1,551 pounds. In the second quarter of this year, it was 1,559 pounds. So, we've kind of seen it stabilize around this sort of 1,550 range, and it's been sort of plus or minus £10. But it did drop a little bit in August and then sort of came back in September, and it's trending well in October thus far as well. So, I think we still continue to see the economy is stable with prior periods, not really improving, not really getting worse, but we're at least happy to see that the weight per shipment has stabilized.
And my follow-up is going to be around the new overtime law that's coming into effect here, what kind of impact might that have on your business, if any?
The total number is not a big deal for us. I think we had somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 affected people.
Operator
Our next question comes from Scott Group. Your line is open.
Adam, just on the October tonnage, do you have like the sequential change versus the 10-year history on that?
Yes, in October or September?
I guess we'll take both?
Yes, in September, we were up 3.6% over August versus the 10-year average of above 2.8%, but recall that August was below trend. And then thus far in October, on a weight per day basis, we are trending down about 4.5%, and that is compared to the 10-year average which was down 3.5%. So, it's kind of back to this choppiness and our volumes are a little bit lighter in October than perhaps what we thought we might see, but our yield performance is good, and as I mentioned, the revenue per day in October this year versus last year is better.
Scott, I would like to add, this is David. I want to provide some commentary on our sequential averages, particularly our 10-year history. You might remember that in the early 2000s, we were expanding geographically every year. Our last acquisition was in Montana in 2008, which contributed to our geographic expansion over the last decade. Additionally, you could look at YRC in 2007 and 2008, which had approximately $10 billion in sales, but those sales fell to $5 billion or less. Even as their economy has recovered and overall tonnage in LTL has increased, they haven't regained that lost freight, which I believe has redistributed among various carriers. Currently, we aren't experiencing the impact of a $5 billion worth of YRC revenue entering the market since they're stable. Therefore, when we discuss our sequential trends versus our 10-year average, it's a challenging comparison.
Yes, that actually makes a lot of sense. So, I guess just to follow up on that point, David. Is it fair then to think that the pace of share gains going forward realistically, it's just not going to be the same as what we saw in the past, if you're not expanding geographies and YRC shares more stable?
We will continue to expand our geographic presence. Currently, we operate in 48 states, and we have plans for 35 to 40 additional service centers. This will help increase our density and market share in these areas. We have a solid plan for future growth and have maintained capacity for growth over the past decades. We believe this strategy will enable us to continue gaining market share. In the current soft economy, our rate of market share gain has slowed because shippers are looking to save costs. Of our 90,000 active shippers each month, about 95% also use other LTL carriers which are also stable and may offer lower prices. However, we are confident that we are the best-positioned carrier to benefit when the economy improves, with the most capacity to handle growth.
If I could just ask one last one. So, we typically think about higher fuel as a positive for your and just broader LTL earnings. Is that start to play out in the fourth quarter? Is anything to keep in mind that might not be the case right now?
Yes, fuel prices are certainly moving north. We still, in terms of where prices are today, that to the average deal rate price was $2.50 in the fourth quarter of last year. So, we're starting to approach that number in the last couple of weeks, but we are still sort of even or slightly below what the average price was last year. But certainly, it helps leverage all of our other fixed costs if revenues are increasing. We saw a little bit of that play out in the third quarter. As prices started to rise, it helped the top line, and we did not have as much of a headwind on a top line basis from the decrease in fuel that we've seen in the past two quarters.
Operator
Thank you. We will move next to Chris Wetherbee. Your line is open.
I want to clarify if you provided the September tonnage compared to last year. I just want to make sure I have that information.
On a year-over-year basis, it was down 1.2%.
Okay, that’s helpful. And so when you think about sort of the dynamic of September versus October, is this sort of indicative of kind of bounce along a bottom or trough in terms of the tonnage dynamic? Just wanted to get a sense, I don’t want to overplay sort of month-to-month comparisons, but just want to get a sense of what’s going on with the weight per shipment, if you feel like there is anything different or changed and customers are giving any indication in that respect?
I don't think so. Last October was a little bit of an odd month for us. Our weight for shipment dipped down. Weight for shipment in October last year was only 1,529 pounds, and it came back stronger in November and December, but things feel normal. We do have one last workday in this October than last year and sometimes that causes some slight changes in the metrics. But things feel about the same to us, and certainly, we're pleased with the way September closed out. We felt good about those trends, but when you look through the economic numbers whether it's industrial production or whatever, we've kind of had some months of up and down. And I think that's what we're kind of seeing in our volume trend.
Okay.
Our yield continues to perform very well, so our revenue per day is hanging in there pretty good.
Okay, that makes sense. I wanted to follow up on the potential challenges to the reported yield numbers, even though they remained flat sequentially. Looking ahead, do you think you can sustain the pricing dynamics we're currently observing, particularly in terms of revenue per hundredweight excluding fuel? Is that the kind of trend you've previously mentioned? I understand renewals are in the three to four range, but I’d like to get a sense of how you see this developing in the next couple of quarters.
We certainly are going to stick to our guns and our pricing philosophies that have worked for us in the past. And when you look at it, the absolute revenue per hundredweight number ex-fuel was higher in the third quarter than it was in the second. We continue to deliver a value proposition we think and are going to continue to deliver the very best service at a fair price and return that allows us to continue to make the investments in our company. But we see things as fairly stable in the market, and we'll continue to target increases that we need to offset our cost inflation.
Operator
Our next question comes from Allison Landry. Your line is open.
Hi. Good morning. This is Danny Schuster for Allison. I was wondering if you can share with us your updated 10-year average sequential trends for November and December?
Sure. In your average in November is a 3.2% increase and the 10-year average for December is a 9.2% decrease.
Okay. And based on your previous commentary regarding YRC and geographic expansion not being and there should we expect sequential trends to be a little bit lighter than those trends? Or were you just making that comment in reference to the October trends?
I think that was just a general comment. I mean, those are obviously based on the numbers. This year, our volume trends have been lower than what the 10-year average when you just look at a quarterly basis. And I think a lot of that is a reflection of the economy, but for the third quarter you certainly had your normal seasonality played out. And from a weight per day standpoint, we were up 1.2% over the second quarter. And as I mentioned, that from a quarterly standpoint, that average was at 1.9%. Fortunately, getting back to the yield from just an overall revenue per day standpoint, the 10-year average increase in revenue per day, over the second quarter is 3.3%, and that's where we're for the quarter. So, we had a little bit softer volume performance than longer-term trends. But our yield performance was a little bit better, so our revenue per day was right in line with sort of our long-term average and seasonality trends.
And then just for modeling purposes, would you mind sharing the quarterly workdays for 2017?
Yes, for 2017, we do have one less workday overall. There will be 64 days in the first quarter, 64 days in the second quarter, 63 days in the third quarter which we had 64 this year, and then 62 days in the fourth quarter of 2017.
Operator
Our next question is from Ravi Shanker. Your line is open.
Are you surprised to see the pricing or stability at the levels you're seeing right now? And does that bode well for bigger GRIs as the market improves?
We haven’t been surprised. We talked all year that we thought that LTL pricing would remain stable for a few key reasons, and it's the consolidation of the market. And when you look at where average industry margins are and basically where capacity is, we felt like those three scenarios would be supportive of better LTL pricing. Truckload pricing has obviously suffered a little bit this year and there may have been some volume swap from LTL into truckload for that very reason, on some of the higher weighted LTL shipments. But we felt like the industry needed to continue to push price, because we feel like the other industry participants need to continue. When you look at some of the density metrics, about every carrier has made improvements from the revenue per service standpoint. But it's the improvement that needs to come from the yield that can lead to better margins, and a margin that can support reinvestment.
Is there room for upside as the market improves or do you think it's going to stabilize at these levels?
That's hard to say. Our pricing philosophy is, we ask for rate increases to really offset what cost inflation and what the profitability on each customer account is. And so we feel like we can sit across the table and have those conversations, and that's what we'll continue to do. And we've mentioned in our prepared remarks, we are going to continue to target contractual increases in that 3% to 4% range that we've been able to get the last couple of years.
Great. And just a last one. How do you think about CapEx in the lower term and clearly step down this year? Again, is this the right level to think of on an ongoing basis?
From an equipment perspective, we may have overestimated our expected volume this year. The economy did not perform as anticipated, so we are not disclosing the CapEx number today. Our focus is currently on the equipment required for our replacement program. If the economy improves, we might increase that number throughout the year and consider adding equipment for growth. At this point, we are solely concentrating on our replacement program and next year’s equipment needs. Our real estate holdings remain significant and potentially slightly higher than last year, while our technology expenditures are somewhat elevated compared to 2016. We expect a reduction in CapEx, yet it will still be considerable. We plan to finalize our numbers after assessing the fourth quarter and will share details with you in January.
Operator
Thank you. Our next question is from Matt Brooklier. Your line is open.
So just a question around the truckload market, we've seen improvement on a truckload side of things. So let's call since June-ish directionally, it's been kind of moderate, but there has been some improvement there. So I was just curious to hear, if the change in the truckload market, if it had any impact on your business, whether it be from a volume or price perspective?
Not in any material way. I think that some of that movement just sort of happens on the fringe and I don’t know that we are really only other LTL carriers have seen any significant movement because I still think there is probably oversupply right now in the truckload area.
Okay. And then Adam, do you have the service center count for 3Q?
It was 226 service centers.
226 okay, appreciate the time.
Operator
Our next question comes from Ari Rosa. Your line is open.
So, first question I wanted to start on the operating ratio. You mentioned the economy continues to be a bit tepid, but I'm wondering what kind of OR levels you think you might be able to reach if some volume growth returns. Obviously, there is a decent amount of operating leverage embedded in your business, and you're hitting operating levels that are pretty impressive right now. I think you said close to record, so I just wanted to hear your thoughts on what kind of improvements we might see as volume growth returns?
We believe that if the economy improves and we continue to enhance density, yield, and productivity, there is potential to further reduce our operating ratio. While we don't specify a target for how low it can go, we are confident that there is room for margin improvement if we have all four key factors working together.
Okay, that’s helpful. And just, I am thinking about the competitor dynamics, one of your competitors noted in intention to expand their geographic footprint. Obviously, some of your other competitors are talking about being aggressive in terms of growth. Just wanted to hear your thoughts on what the state of the competitive landscape looks like, and if it changed versus say 12 months ago?
That hasn't exactly changed because they haven't opened up those service centers up north yet. I know who you're referring to. But I’ll tell you that I think they've got their work cut out for them. It's a difficult environment and they are up against extremely strong service competition. We would be number one in that category of strong service competition. And then you have a couple of other private carriers that are really strong in the East South markets. If they don't give the service, they're going to have a hard time building the density in the lanes. And if they resort to reducing prices to get density then the profitability won't be there, and they're going to have a tough time with their operating ratio. So, it's not going to be easy.
And then if I can just sneak one more in, I want to understand you mentioned obviously YRC, some of the challenges that they've experienced over the past several years. Looking forward, where do you see market share gains coming from? Is there a singular source or where can market share go from here, I guess, and what would be the source of that growth?
We are continually bringing on new accounts that we've never done business with. We usually start with a lane or a couple of states maybe for an account. As you build our relationship and prove yourself, you can then grow into additional states for those accounts. The accounts that we do business with to-date, we have a lot of additional market share gains that we can achieve just within our existing account basis as well. So, it's just a matter of serving the customer, building your relationships, giving them the premium service at a fair price. We think that formula has worked well for us and we think it will continue to work.
Operator
Our next question is from David Ross. Your line is open.
Adam, can you talk about the insurance market right now? We first heard from some other carriers that premiums are going up significantly, but you seem to be holding line flat on the insurance and claim side. Are you not seeing that or is your contract up for renewal later this year? Any comments you have there will be great.
We've dealt with that earlier this year really in the first quarter and we were right frankly on the bleeding edge of when some of those carriers exited the market and had to go out and get replacement coverage. We've got good insurance programs. We've got good safety records. And that helped us find some replacement carriers. Fortunately, we didn't have to take too much of a premium increase like may be some of our competitors did. But that's already baked in, as we go through our insurance renewal process in the first quarter and so we lived through that earlier this year.
Is that an annual process or multiyear process?
It's an annual process.
Okay. And then David, anything you're seeing on the regulatory side of floating around DC that concerns you or excites you about the business?
Yes, I believe we have a solid opportunity to restore the hours of service to the desired levels with the unrestricted 34-hour restart. I also feel optimistic about the possibility of passing the F4A legislation again, which prevents states from enacting their own laws that impact our interstate drivers. These are two significant wins on the horizon. Additionally, I would like to highlight ATA and Chris Spear. I believe he is set to excel in his role and has an excellent plan for leading ATA. He has assembled a fantastic team, and I think we currently have the strongest ATA presence on Capitol Hill that we've ever seen.
Operator
Our next question is from Todd Fowler. Your line is open.
Can you talk about how much residential or home delivery you are doing? And I'm not talking about home moving, but actual delivery to homes probably from B2C type environments? And how you view that market either for you or for the LTL space going forward?
We have a very small portion of our customer base focused on home deliveries. However, we are equipped to handle home deliveries, as each of our service centers has multiple liftgate trailers. We can and do make deliveries in neighborhoods. This segment is expected to grow as the market continues to expand. The challenge we face is competing with companies like Amazon that offer free delivery. Home delivery incurs costs, and those costs need to be sustainable. We currently have accessorial charges for our residential deliveries that are financially viable for us, but we cannot offer this service for free.
So, it sounds like a capability that you have, but it's not an area that you are aggressively focused on or at least you're kind of maybe the margin or the price point right now?
Talk about strategically and have for the last several years, but we are not actively focused on it at this point.
Okay. That helps. Just two expense of cost ones. Adam is the depreciation run rate here in the third quarter is that caught up given the investment and rolling stock in the first half of the year, does that continue to move up? And then just the second one, you mentioned the fringe cost being elevated, can you talk a little bit more about what that's related to and does that remain into 2017 or is that just something from our cost during the back half of the year?
First, regarding depreciation, we might see a slight increase as we enter the fourth quarter. Most of it has been accounted for as we have received most of the revenue equipment during the quarter, although some items came online late in the quarter. We also have a few replacement trailers expected in the fourth quarter, which will cause a small sequential increase. On the fringe side, we've faced challenges that began in the fourth quarter of last year, mainly related to group health and dental expenses, which have been unfavorable since then. We're actively working on this issue, and I anticipate it will persist into the fourth quarter. Last quarter's performance was better, helped by certain retirement benefit plan costs linked to stock price fluctuations. However, health-related costs are expected to continue, though it's uncertain if that trend will extend into 2017. We're focusing on this matter internally and discussing potential changes to our programs and preventive measures to promote employee health. The rise in costs isn't due to severity but rather the frequency of claims filed this year, so we need to remain vigilant and seek improvements.
Operator
Thank you. Our next question is from Ben Hartford.
Adam, just I wonder if you can give an update on the ongoing IT initiatives you have?
Sure, we continue to work at it. It's a big multiyear effort. I think that we have got some little pieces and applications that have gone live and are performing well. A lot of this, the upfront work in this first couple of years was really building our new data center, getting the new boxes in place, and really setting the platform up to start converting our system. We are getting into the mid of this thing where more applications, the coding is done and returning them live in pilot programs. But we are certainly going slow with it. I think that it could be detrimental. We have had competitors to put systems in, whether it's a billing system or whatever, to their detriment. So, we are going about this in a flow, in a methodical way and hopefully driving some improvement as we turn any of these applications live.
Did you disclose the percent of your shipments handled through third-party brokers this quarter, if not, could you give that number? And then, any plans to meaningfully change that number over the next 12 months?
It's continues to trend at around 35%, somewhere in that ballpark. And it's increased over time. It likely will continue to increase as more and more business continues to be handled by the third-party logistics carriers. As they're using their TMS systems and so forth and trying to add value to customer supply chain, we obviously would like to have those customer relationships direct. So, it's not anything that we are targeting, but certainly, those strategic third-party logistics companies that we have good relationships with, we will continue to build on those relationships. That can be a source of market share for us; if they're bringing freight to us, it's being handled by another carrier. If they go out and they are selling our value proposition on our behalf, then that can be an area of growth for us.
Operator
We have a question from Taylor Brown. Your line is open.
Just want to go back to the LTL dynamic here. And David, I appreciate this is a bit of an odd question, but do you guys track something like a nose load percentage and are you seeing that percentage fall, maybe indicating some of those bigger loads are making their way into LTL? I guess at a high level have you seen anything funny in that 10,000-pound market?
Honestly, we don’t track a nose load or head load percentage. I've never seen a number on that.
Is there anything funny in that 10,000-pound market?
I think that our weight per shipment is staying the same. We saw a little bit of that going back all the way to 2014, where we saw increases in some of those really heavy weight LTL shipments that we were handling. But right now, we look at sort of less than 10,000 pounds shipments or 10,000 and greater, and those are very few that are in that greater than 10,000.
Okay.
Probably a lot of that is they can find a truckload carrier that will deliver at a much lower rate per mile than what we would.
Typically when a customer has a 9,000 or 10,000-pound shipment available, they go out and shop it. And that would show up in our stock quote systems and stock loads and those kinds of things. Because I think the average weight of our stock loads was 9,000 pounds last time I saw it.
Then, I'm just curious about the comments regarding adding more service centers. So you guys are running let's call it 99% on-time, which indicates that your P&D service is already really good. So, I am curious, like why would adding more service centers really help with saturation in any given market? My guess is, adding those centers would help lower your pedal times. But would that be more of a cost benefit than a revenue driver or how should we think about that?
It's both because, especially in large markets like Atlanta, Georgia or Chicago, or New York Metro even the Dallas or the Metropolis or even in Huston, yes, big market Southern California. When we first started in those markets, we had one service center. And we grew as much as we could and we had a lot of the P&D, the cost was really high. We had a lot of what we call, windshield time. The drivers were having to drive out and have freight delivered and then come back. The cost of that was fairly high. We have found our market shares on outbound from outlying markets are not as good as it is close to the service center. So, when we opened up service centers in those large markets with multiple centers, we get closer to the customers, and we can increase our share of the outbound from those markets.
Operator
And there are no further questions at this time. I'll be happy to return the call to Mr. Earl Congdon for any concluding remarks.
As always, thank you very much for your participation. We appreciate your questions and your support of OD. Please feel free to give us a call if you have any further questions. Thanks again and good day.
Operator
This does conclude today's conference. You may now disconnect your lines and everyone have a great day.