Key Currency Exchange Rates for Friday, 1/21/22

American Dollar to Canadian Dollar = 0.778025; American Dollar to Chinese Yuan = 0.148415; American Dollar to Euro = 1.019709; American Dollar to Japanese Yen = 0.007476; American Dollar to Mexican Peso = 0.049361.

American Trucking Associations’ advanced seasonally adjusted For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index grew 1.8% in August after rising 0.4% in July. In August, the index equaled 115.8 (2015=100) compared with 113.8 in July. “August tonnage levels rose to the highest level since February 2023,” said ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello. “Not only does the latest robust gain show freight levels are coming off the bottom, but so does the sequential pattern over the last eight months. Starting earlier this year, every time tonnage falls, it is higher than the previous low. For me, this month-to-month pattern is more important than looking at the year-over-year percent changes since we are at an inflection point in the freight market.” July’s increase was revised up from our August 20 press release. Compared with August 2023, the index increased 0.7%, just the second year-over-year gain in the last eighteen months (the other being in May 2024).

Marketers’ disgust with online ad fraud has created an opening for our industry, but we’re not ready to take advantage of it. Our out-of-date, out-of-synch approaches to magazine advertising proposals are holding us back from taking advantage of this new opportunity. Judging from my interactions with advertising sales reps, they’re seeing fewer digital-only RFPs these days and more media-agnostic ones. Marketers who were in the “print is dead” camp now seem intrigued with the ability of print to engage their most valuable prospects. But simply buying ad pages in general-interest magazines is not their idea of effective targeting.