Railroad stocks rise amid workers reaching tentative labor agreement

Railroad stocks like Union Pacific Corporation and Norfolk Southern rose slightly upon news of railway workers and carriers reaching a tentative agreement and narrowly avoiding a major strike.

Video Transcript

[AUDIO LOGO]

DAVE BRIGGS: Let's get over to Jared Blikre now for the investor story on the fact that we averted a rail strike at the last minute, sir.

JARED BLIKRE: Yes, and it's-- supposedly the Northeast Corridor was supposed to be spared but we don't want to test these things. Not at all.

DAVE BRIGGS: No, we don't.

JARED BLIKRE: You can see, this is our shipping heat map. And not a whole lot of movement. Kind of a mixed board with respect to the railroads. So we see CS-- CSX is down 3%. UNP is up 8/10 of a percent. Norfork-- Norfolk Southern is up 2/10 of a percent.

Let's get a year-to-date view. We've seen a lot of action in this sector. And we know that shipping costs, overall, have been high. Of course, we're talking about the passenger rail system. But it's all kind of-- it's all kind of related here.

By the way, some details of the deal-- $5,000 in bonuses, 25% increased pay for the workers, plus some modest healthcare benefits so good to see that. But you can see, all of these stocks largely under pressure for most of the year. Although, I would note, not nearly as much as some of those growth stocks that we've seen.

So nevertheless, let me just get a quick check on the rest of the travel space today. And we can see kind of a mixed board. Trip.com up 1%. Some of the airlines faring well. United's up 2%. And even Carnival Cruise lines, that's up 4 and 1/2%, guys. So overall, not the worst day for shipping and probably some good news for a lot of people back home in those Amtrak jobs and the people who want to take those trains.