Transport and logistics equities fell broadly on Friday in Asian trading following a wave of selling that began in the United States after reports about a new AI freight platform from U.S. firm Algorhythm Holdings. The moves reflected investor concerns that the technology could make freight movements materially more efficient and, in turn, reduce demand for traditional logistics services.
Earlier in the week, a media report said Algorhythm’s AI-enhanced SemiCab platform allows operators to substantially increase freight volumes without adding staff. Those details triggered notable declines across transport names in U.S. trading on Thursday, and the weakness spread to Europe and then Asia.
In the United States, major transport and freight brokers and carriers such as C.H. Robinson, RXO and Landstar System were among the hardest hit during Thursday’s session. Other large names including J.B. Hunt Transportation and XPO also fell, marking the sector’s worst trading day since President Donald Trump unveiled sweeping tariffs in April last year.
European logistics groups did not escape the selling. Companies such as DHL Group, Kuehne + Nagel International and DSV saw their shares fall as the rout extended overseas. The declines later reached Asia, where Japanese carriers Nippon Express Holdings and Yamato Holdings were dragged lower by the global sell-off.
Analysts at Vital Knowledge summed up the market reaction succinctly: "For Thursday specifically, the AI grim reaper came for transports," they said in a note.
Algorhythm’s own stock jumped sharply in response to the coverage and the firm’s statements. Shares rose roughly 20% in premarket trading on Friday, after a near 29.9% gain in the prior session. Until the recent days of market attention, Algorhythm had been categorized by market scale as a penny stock and had previously focused on in-car karaoke systems.
According to reporting that cited a company press release, Algorhythm said its SemiCab platform can enable operators to scale freight volumes by as much as 400% without increasing headcount. The same press release, as reported, claimed SemiCab can cut "empty freight miles" by more than 70% across active customer networks.
The company also stated, per the report, that trucks are running empty nearly one out of every three miles, a dynamic it estimated costs more than $1 trillion in freight spending per year.
The market moves underscored investor sensitivity to AI-driven productivity claims and the potential consequences for sectors that rely on human labor and traditional service volumes. In this episode, transport and logistics companies bore the brunt of the reassessment as traders priced in the possibility that improved routing and capacity utilization could reduce revenue opportunities for established providers.
Also included in investor materials circulated during the period were claims about AI-driven portfolios and performance statistics. Those materials reported that, year to date, two out of three global portfolios were outperforming their benchmark indexes with 88% of portfolios in positive territory. The materials further asserted that a flagship strategy doubled the S&P 500 within 18 months and cited individual winners with strong percentage gains.
The sequence of events - substantial upward moves in Algorhythm shares coupled with sharp declines in broader transport names - left markets worldwide recalibrating sector risk amid heightened focus on how new AI tools could reshape operational throughput and demand for logistics services.