The company’s LTL division reported a 13% decrease in revenue to $703.7 million from $794.2 million in the same period 12 months earlier. (TFI International)
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TFI International posted double-digit percentage declines in profit and revenue in the second quarter of 2025, with cross-border tariffs hampering its less-than-truckload operations — historically its most profitable — as well as its truckload unit.
“We’re most affected by the [tariff] instability in our industrial truckload base in the U.S.,” TFI CEO Alain Bédard said during a July 28 conference call with investors after the carrier’s earnings were released. “A lot of our customers are just waiting on the sideline to say, ‘Hey, where are we going? Where is this going to happen? Where is this going to end?’ Our miles in our specialty truckload are down like around 10%, which is not normal.” He added, “It’s quiet. It’s very quiet right now.”
Tariffs on steel and aluminum imported into the U.S. were introduced in March and increased in June.
Montreal-based TFI posted Q2 net income of $98.2 million, a 17.8% decrease compared with $115.7 million in Q2 2024, the company said. Revenue in the quarter totaled $2.04 billion, down 10.1% from $2.27 billion in the year-ago period.
The company’s LTL division reported a 13% decrease in revenue to $703.7 million from $794.2 million in the same period 12 months earlier. The truckload operation posted $712.3 million in revenue for the quarter, a 6% decline compared with $737.7 million in the year-ago period. TFI’s logistics unit saw a 12% fall in Q2 revenue to $393.1 million from $442.4 million.
TFI’s truckload operations posted an operating ratio of 90.1 in Q2, compared with 89.0 in the same period 12 months earlier.
TFI Q2 2025 Earnings
A carrier’s OR provides insight into how well it is balancing its costs and revenue generation. The lower the ratio, the better a company’s performance.
The company’s specialty truckload division — underpinned by the former operations of flatbed carrier Daseke, which TFI acquired in 2023 — reported an OR of 90.3, compared with 88.7 a year earlier.
TFI’s Canadian conventional truckload unit was the only segment to see an improvement in its OR, with 88.3 in the most recent quarter, compared with 89.3 a year earlier. TFI’s LTL division posted a combined operating ratio of 89.5, compared with 86.2 a year earlier. Within the division, the company’s U.S. LTL unit reported a 94.0 OR in Q2, compared with 90.8 in the same period a year earlier. However, the unit saw its average weight per shipment climb 5.2% to 1,284 lb. from 1,221 lb. in Q2 2024.
The U.S. LTL unit posted $434.5 million in revenue, down 11.7% compared with $492.2 million a year earlier.
TFI’s Canadian LTL operations also reported a softer OR, which weakened to 80.6 from 75.6 in the year-ago period.
Revenue at the Canadian LTL unit decreased 8.8% year over year to $131.3 million from $143.9 million.
“If you look at our Canadian LTL, we’re down,” Bédard said. “We’re still doing really well, but we’re down. And one of the reasons we’re down is because all the trade between U.S. and Canada on the LTL side is down. And this is the most profitable business that we have on the LTL side — the trade between the U.S. and Canada.”
“Normally the flow is two north, one south. Right now, the two north are down to about one. So, we are losing. Now, the minute the [tariff situation] is settled with Canada and Mexico, we should do fine. Things will come back. It’s just like this kind of instability right now,” he said.
Sales to small- to medium-sized customers, missed pickups and claims levels all improved during Q2, gains TFI credited to the effects of some Q1 management changes.
The company also shrank its warehouse footprint. TFI at the end of Q2 had 636 facilities, compared with 688 facilities a year earlier. Of the 636 facilities, 378 are in the U.S. and 258 in Canada. In the last 12 months, terminal consolidation saw TFI part with 58 facilities even as it added six facilities following acquisitions.
“In terms of U.S. LTL real estate, we still have about 3,000 doors too many — 3,000 to 4,000 doors too many. So, you should see us during the next six months do some trades, some swaps with some of our peers that we do all the time. That should help us reduce the carrying cost of [the] real estate that we have no use for,” Bédard said.
TFI is also cutting its rolling stock levels. The company’s U.S. LTL operations had 4,298 tractors and trucks as of June 30, down 2.7% compared with 4,416 a year earlier.
“What we’re selling is the old UPS Freight trucks with very little value. So, there’s not much capital to regain from the sale. We still have way too many trailers over there and too many trucks, but not a lot of capital tied up there,” said Bédard.
TFI ranks No. 4 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of the largest for-hire carriers in North America and No. 6 on TT’s list of the top LTL carriers. It ranks No. 39 on the TT Top 100 list of the largest logistics companies.
