DC Velocity - August 2019

newsmakers

Lakefront Futures launches trucking derivatives group for risk hedging in freight

Chicago-based Lakefront Futures & Options LLC has launched a risk-hedging group focused on the trucking and freight sector, designed to help shippers, motor carriers, and third-party logistics service providers (3PLs) manage volatility risk in trucking rates and fuel costs.

Gary Saykaly is running the derivatives group, which will open a branch office in Atlanta to handle the trucking and freight derivatives business for the company nationwide.

The business will focus on helping participants navigate and mitigate price risk via the trucking freight forward and futures markets as well as the fuel derivative markets, Saykaly said. It comes on the heels of the launch of a freight futures market this past March by partners logistics data and analytics provider Freight Waves, price reporting agency DAT, and derivatives exchange and clearing house Nodal Exchange. Lakefront’s new venture will allow participants to trade trucking-related derivative contracts to hedge trucking rates and fuel costs in the futures and options market, Saykaly said.

“The trucking and freight sector is currently going through a paradigm shift with the digitization of the industry and the launching of both a trucking forward and futures market. We are now in a three-dimensional trucking market—spot, forward, and futures—and the optimal execution strategies for market participants might be engineered via a combination of solutions in all three markets,” Saykaly said, adding that the FreightWaves/DAT/ Nodal Exchange trucking freight futures product is one of the hedging tools the company will offer its clients. “We are focused on helping participants navigate the new market and develop engineered strategies for risk mitigation, trucking capacity procurement, and accessing load volume by a combination of solutions in all three markets.”

Online retailer Amazon.com said it will invest more than $700 million in “upskill” training for 100,000 of its U.S. employees over the next six years in a program it’s calling Upskill 2025. The initiative will give employees access to training so they can move into highly skilled technical and non-technical roles in the company’s corporate offices, tech hubs, fulfillment centers, retail stores, and transportation network. It will also allow them to pursue careers outside of Amazon, Beth Galetti, Amazon’s senior vice president, human resources, said in a statement.

Logistics will be a big part of the skills-development program. Among the e-tailer’s fastest-growing highly skilled jobs are logistics coordinator, process improvement manager, and transportation specialist in its customer fulfillment network, Amazon said. That’s in addition to growing demand for data scientists, solutions architects, and business analysts, company leaders also said.

Amazon said it will offer a range
of programs across various disci-
plines, including:
b Amazon Technical Academy,
which equips non-technical Amazon employees with the skills to tran-
sition into software engineering careers;
b Associate Tech, which trains fulfillment center associates to move
into technical roles regardless of their previous IT experience;
b Machine Learning University, which offers employees with techni-
cal backgrounds the opportunity to access machine-learning skills via
an on-site training program;
b Amazon Career Choice, a prepaid tuition program designed to
train fulfillment center associates in high-demand occupations of
their choice;
b Amazon Apprenticeship, a Department of Labor-certified pro-
gram that offers paid intensive classroom training and on-the-job
apprenticeships with Amazon; and
b AWS (Amazon Web Services) Training and Certification, which
provides employees with courses to build practical AWS Cloud
knowledge.
Amazon to invest $700 million in “upskill”
training for employees
go figure …

July 17

The date that clothing and housewares retailer Kohl’s started hiring extra employees for the winter shopping peak, announcing an “early wave of seasonal positions” at 500 stores. The company will begin seasonal hiring for its distribution and e-commerce fulfillment centers this month.