UPS reported first-quarter 2024 revenue of $21.7 billion, down 5.3% year over year, and operating profit of $1.6 billion, down 36.5%. The company said average daily U.S. volume improved through the quarter, while total U.S. Domestic revenue fell 5.0%, driven by a 3.2% drop in average daily volume. [story-s1]
The three reporting groups did not move in lockstep: International revenue fell 6.3%, with average daily volume down 5.8%; Supply Chain Solutions revenue declined 5.3%, primarily because of lower forwarding market rates. UPS reaffirmed its 2024 targets: revenue of about $92.0 billion to $94.5 billion and adjusted operating margin of about 10.0% to 10.6%. [story-s1]
That combination makes the company’s outlook more useful than treating the headline revenue decline as a uniform measure of demand. The release points to volume weakness across its two delivery segments, but describes forwarding rate declines as the main pressure in Supply Chain Solutions. The pattern matters operationally: volume measures package flow, while forwarding rates can alter revenue even apart from shipment counts. UPS’s release does not quantify the separate contribution of each factor to the broader companywide decline beyond the segment explanations it gives, so the results should not be read as a full decomposition of the 5.3% consolidated drop. Nor does a reaffirmed annual target mean the quarter itself had returned to growth. These are company-reported results and guidance, not evidence of what individual small businesses experienced. [story-s1]
Source documents
- UPS Releases 1Q 2024 Earningshttps://about.ups.com/us/en/newsroom/press-releases/financials/ups-releases-1q-2024-earnings.html