Two months after Steve Angel joined CSX Corp. as president and CEO, two other C-Suite executives of the Jacksonville-based railroad company said the transition is going well.
“We’re so much aligned in terms of the detail, making sure that we align our resources properly to get the efficiencies out of them. It’s just been fantastic for the first month and change,” Chief Operating Officer Mike Cory said Dec. 2 at the UBS Global Industrials and Transportation Conference in Palm Beach.
“I equate it to sports,” Chief Financial Officer Kevin Boone said at the conference.
“People like to be on a winning team, and he’s got clearly a track record of winning, and I think that excites a lot of people, especially the leadership and all the managers and all those that are around that want to win in the market,” he said.
Angel, former CEO of industrial gas and engineering company Linde plc, replaced Joe Hinrichs as chief executive Sept. 28.
“As we speak right now, we’ve got people together looking for synergies that we maybe didn’t look at the same way prior and with Steve, our focus is on service and productivity and price. There’s no question about it and it’s uplifting,” Cory said.
“I think there’s a lot of energy around the building, at least I know and I think out in the field as well,” Boone said.
“He came from an industry, obviously, that in a lot of ways is very similar to ours, focused on price,” he said. “We’re always looking to deliver better service and get paid for that service.”
“I think he’s going to lean into the tools so we can really make sure we understand where there are pricing opportunities,” Boone said. He also expects Angel to make investments to improve the company’s technology.
Looking at the market for CSX’s freight service for the rest of the fourth quarter and into 2026, Boone said the outlook is uncertain.
“Everybody knows where the industrial economy right now is. It’s a pretty mixed bag, right? We’re seeing a lot of challenges in some markets, some opportunities in others, but it’s a very, very mixed bag,” he said.
“The industrial economy has been struggling this year and we have a diverse portfolio, which makes it obviously challenging in some areas, and then we’re going after opportunities.”
Boone said the freight transport markets are strong for metals, minerals and fertilizers, while chemicals and forest products are some of the weaker markets.
He said weakness persists in housing and automobiles.
“The good news is it feels we’re at the lower end of the cycle in those two areas so at some point, we should see that those markets rebound,” Boone said.
“I’m not calling for a rebound necessarily next year. We’ll see, but there is cyclical opportunity in those businesses and we’re well set up, I think, to benefit from that.”
As Boone and Cory spoke at the conference, they were waiting to see the application for the proposed merger of Union Pacific Corp. and Norfolk Southern Corp., which was announced in July.
The application was expected to be filed with the U.S. Surface Transportation Board by the end of last week but several reports indicate the companies now will file it next week.
“I actually thought they’re going to file right before Thanksgiving and try to ruin our weekend, but that didn’t happen,” Boone said.
CSX officials will be scrutinizing the application to see how the proposed merger of a major western railroad and CSX’s chief rival in the eastern U.S., Norfolk Southern, will affect the company.
“It’s going to be a long story. It’s a long road ahead,” Boone said.
The merger has sparked speculation that CSX would have to seek a merger to compete, despite opposition to a deal from previous CEO Hinrichs.
Speculation has centered on a merger with the other major western railroad, BNSF Railway, owned by Berkshire Hathaway Inc.
Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett has said he’s not interested in a deal with CSX and BNSF indicated more opposition to mergers by filing a challenge to a previous Union Pacific deal.
BNSF said Dec. 1 it is seeking a review of the 1996 merger of Union Pacific and Southern Pacific by the STB, saying actions by Union Pacific have affected competition and harmed customers.
“Before considering any new consolidation, we ask the board to ensure the commitments made during the UP/SP merger are honored, and that competition is, at a minimum, preserved as required under the prior merger standards,” BNSF Executive Vice President and Chief Legal Officer Jill Mulligan said in a news release.
Boone said CSX will continue to operate from a position of strength no matter how the Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern deal plays out.
“We have a network that’s obviously very valuable to all the railroads out there,” Boone said.
“UP is also an important partner of ours. We’ll continue to work with them and move freight because there’s a lot of customers that we serve on each side that still want that service to remain,” he said.
“We’ll obviously want to protect our competitive position going forward and evaluate the filing when it comes out.”
Landstar System Inc.’s earnings have been falling for three consecutive years as the Jacksonville-based trucking company deals with a continued slump in freight traffic.
However, that hasn’t stopped the company from paying dividends to its shareholders.
Landstar on Dec. 3 declared a special dividend of $2 per share for the seventh straight year.
The company has also been increasing its quarterly dividend every year since 2014, raising it from 36 cents a share to 40 cents in June.
“Landstar’s strong balance sheet and free cash flow generation position us to continue delivering value to our stockholders,” CEO Frank Lonegro said in a news release.
While shareholders continue to reap the benefits of dividend payments, one analyst is not expecting gains in the trading price of the stock.
Wells Fargo Securities analyst Christian Wetherbee initiated coverage of Landstar Dec. 5 with an “equal weight” rating and a $145 price target, with the stock trading at $140.68 at the time of his report.
“We see signs of improvement and are generally constructive on the potential for better truckload rates in 2026, but we believe the lack of demand in 4Q/1Q presents a degree of risk to estimates and sentiment in the near-term,” Wetherbee said in his report.
“We also see elevated expectations, which are not unique to Landstar, as a potential headwind,” he said.
Regency Centers Corp. has touted the strong performance of its portfolio of grocery-anchored shopping centers across the country, saying it has not been hurt too much by the downfall of some major retail chains.
However, one analyst said the strength of its portfolio makes Jacksonville-based Regency’s stock price less likely to rise.
Todd Thomas, equity research analyst at KeyBanc Capital Markets, downgraded Regency from “overweight” to “sector weight” in a Dec. 5 report on real estate investment trusts.
“Our downgrade reflects a more balanced risk/reward profile,” Thomas said.
“While we remain constructive on Regency’s high-quality retail asset mix, strong balance sheet, and ongoing development initiatives, relative upside appears limited vs. peers that faced greater disruption from retailer bankruptcies and tenant turnover in 2024/2025, which now offer more recovery potential,” he said.
Ireland-based Trane Technologies plc announced Dec. 2 it agreed to buy the digital business of Jacksonville-based Stellar Energy International Ltd.
Trane said Stellar Energy Digital provides turnkey liquid-to-chip data center cooling solutions.
The Stellar unit will retain its brand and operate under the commercial HVAC business of Trane’s Americas segment, the company said.
Trane, which provides commercial heating, cooling and ventilation systems, reported $16.2 billion in revenue in the first nine months of 2025, including $13.2 billion in its Americas segment which encompasses North America and Latin America.
The company said the addition of Stellar’s digital business expands its operations in the data center thermal management solutions market.
“The data center ecosystem is growing rapidly and evolving toward more agile, sustainable solutions, which is where Stellar Energy excels with leading co-engineered, modular solutions and a proven business model,” Karin De Bondt, chief strategy officer of Trane, said in a news release.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
ZenaTech Inc. said Dec. 2 it acquired Jacksonville-based Smith Surveying Group LLC, its second recent purchase of a Jacksonville company.
Vancouver, British Columbia-based ZenaTech in September acquired Jacksonville-based A&J Land Surveyor Inc. and announced in October it offered to buy another Jacksonville firm, but it did not name it at that time.
ZenaTech operates drones for inspection, monitoring and surveying services and has been seeking to grow through acquisitions. The addition of Smith Surveying is its 13th acquisition, the company said, with Florida a target market.
“The Florida aviation market is currently experiencing substantial investments in airport expansion and upgrades, which is driving demand for fast and efficient drone-based surveying and inspections, and we are ready to service these needs,” ZenaTech CEO Shaun Passley said in a news release.
Terms of the deal were not announced.