Knight-Swift Q3 Earnings Miss Estimates, Decrease Year Over Year

Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings Inc.’s (KNX) third-quarter 2025 adjusted earnings of 32 cents per share missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 38 cents and declined 5.8% year over year. The reported figure came below the guidedrange of 36-42 cents.

Total revenues of $1.92 million surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.89 million and improved 2.7% year over year. Revenues, excluding truckload and LTL fuel surcharge, grew 2.4% year over year to $1.72 billion.

Total operating expenses (on a reported basis) grew 4.5% year over year to $1.87 billion.

KNX’s Q3 Segmental Results

Revenues (excluding fuel surcharge and inter-segment transactions) from Truckload totaled $1.08 billion, down 2.1% year over year, owing to a 2.3% decrease in loaded miles. Adjusted segmental operating income fell 15% year over year to $41.22 million. Adjusted operating ratio (operating expenses as a percentage of revenues) rose 60 basis points (bps) to 96.2%.  

The Less-Than-Truckload segment generated revenues (excluding fuel surcharges) worth $340.48 million in the third quarter, up 21.5% year over year. Revenue per hundredweight, excluding fuel surcharge, increased 6.1% year over year, while revenue per shipment, excluding fuel surcharge, increased 6.6%. Adjusted segmental operating income was up 10.1% year over year to $32.05 million. Adjusted operating ratio rose 100 bps to 90.6% year over year.

Revenues from Logistics (excluding inter-segment transactions) amounted to $140.4 million, down 2.2% year over year, owing to a 6.2% decline in load count, partially offset by a 3.6% increase in revenue per load. Adjusted operating income increased 1.9% year over year to $8 million. The adjusted operating ratio fell 20 bps to 94.3%.

Intermodal revenues (excluding inter-segment transactions) totaled $94.08 million, down 8.4% year over year, owing to an 11.5% decrease in load count, partially offset by the increase in revenue per load.

Revenues within the All Other Segments for the third quarter increased 29.9%, and operating income grew 86.4% year over year, owing to growth in KNX’s warehousing and leasing businesses.

Liquidity

Knight-Swift exited the third quarter with cash and cash equivalents of $192.67 million compared with $216.32 million at the prior-quarter end. Long-term debt (excluding current maturities) was $1.05 billion compared with $1.39 billion at the end of the prior quarter.

KNX’s Guidance

KNX expects its fourth-quarter 2025 adjusted earnings per share guidance to be in the range of 34-40 cents. The Zacks Consensus Estimate of 39 cents lies within the guidance.

Truckload Segment revenues are expected to be fairly stable sequentially, with operating margins improving 250-350 basis points sequentially. LTL Segment revenues, excluding fuel surcharge, are expected to grow between 10% and 15% year over year in the fourth quarter of 2025. Logistics segment revenue and adjusted operating income are expected to increase by mid-teens percent sequentially. Intermodal segment load count is expected to improve mid-single-digit percent sequentially, with the adjusted operating ratio to remain fairly stable sequentially.

All Other Segments' operating income, before including the $11.7 million quarterly intangible asset amortization, is expected to remain break-even in the fourth quarter.

Net interest expense is expected to decline modestly sequentially in the fourth quarter. Effective tax rate (on adjusted income before taxes) is expected to be 23%-24% for the fourth quarter.

Net cash capital expenditures for 2025 are now expected to be in the range of $475 million- $525 million compared with the prior guidance of $525 million-$575 million.  

Currently, KNX carries a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell).

You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Q3 Performances of Other Transportation Companies

Delta Air Lines DAL reported third-quarter 2025 earnings (excluding 46 cents from non-recurring items) of $1.71 per share, which beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.52. Earnings increased 14% on a year-over-year basis due to low fuel costs.

Revenues in the September-end quarter were $16.67 billion, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $15.79 billion and increasing 6.4% on a year-over-year basis. Due to improving air-travel demand, adjusted operating revenues (excluding third-party refinery sales) increased 4.1% year over year to $15.2 billion. 

J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc. (JBHT) reported third-quarter 2025 earnings of $1.76 per share, which surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.47 and improved 18.1% year over year.

Total operating revenues of $3.05 billion surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $3.02 billion and were down 0.5% year over year. JBHT’s third-quarter revenue performance was hurt by a 1% and 4% decline in gross revenue per load in Intermodal (JBI) and Truckload (JBT), respectively, a decrease in load volume of 8% and 1% in Integrated Capacity Solutions (ICS) and Dedicated Contract Services (DCS), and 8% fewer stops in Final Mile Services (FMS). These items were partially offset by a 3 % improvement in DCS productivity, a 9% increase in revenue per load in ICS and 14% load growth in JBT. Total operating revenue, excluding fuel surcharge revenue, fell less than 1% year over year.

United Airlines Holdings, Inc. (UAL) reported mixed third-quarter 2025 results wherein the company’s earnings beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate, but revenues missed the same.

UAL's third-quarter 2025 adjusted earnings per share (EPS) (excluding 12 cents from non-recurring items) of $2.78 surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $2.64 but declined 16.5% on a year-over-year basis. The reported figure lies above the guided range of $2.25 and $2.75.

Operating revenues of $15.2 billion fell short of the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $15.3 billion but increased 2.6% year over year. Passenger revenues (which accounted for 90.7% of the top line) increased 1.9% year over year to $13.8 billion. UAL flights transported 48,382 passengers in the third quarter, up 6.2% year over year.

Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report

This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

Zacks Investment Research