Wooden pallets keep global supply chains humming, yet millions of the portable platforms go missing every month, either lost, stolen or broken. That’s when Brambles calls in the “pallet detectives,” the WSJ’s Stuart Condle reports, as the Australian shipping materials company tries to recover the modest slats of wood and nails that altogether add up to millions of dollars of lost equipment. Industry officials say part of the problem is that many people think pallets aren’t worth much. Some pallets resurface as makeshift shelving or are repurposed as furniture, while still more simply pile up on the side of the road. Others are targeted by thieves or by organized crime gangs. To help employees in the field, Brambles has screwed around 450,000 GPS trackers onto the blue-painted pallets leased by its CHEP business. The trackers cost $60 each, triple the value of the average wooden pallet, and provide location data. 

• U.S. orders for truck trailers fell 24% in the first half of the year. (Commercial Carrier Journal)

Automakers are having trouble finding their inventory sweet spot. Some manufacturers that struggled with supply-chain disruptions and parts shortages during the pandemic now are  juggling inflated inventories, the WSJ’s Stephen Wilmot writes in Heard on the Street. The car makers are facing the automotive version of the inventory glut that burdened retailers two years ago and triggered sales at stores and a pullback in orders. Automotive shipments in U.S. supply chains already appear to be contracting rapidly this summer. Motor vehicle and parts carloads on U.S. railroads have been falling at a double-digit pace in July after expanding about 3.8% in the first half of the year, according to Association of American Railroads figures. Shipments may get even thinner: Jeep maker Stellantis plans to cut production in the third quarter after reporting that U.S. inventories were too high last quarter, paving the way for discounts. 

• Tesla attributed an amount equal to more than half of its second-quarter profit to the sale of credits to rival automakers that used them to meet emission rules. (WSJ)
• Earnings at Stellantis fell 48% for the first half of the year as U.S. inventories expanded. (WSJ)
• Hyundai Motor’s revenue grew 6.6% in the second quarter. (WSJ)
• Nissan’s net profit dropped 73% last quarter, partly on discounting aimed at reducing inventories. (WSJ)
• STMicroelectronics slashed its annual sales and margin forecasts for the year again on lackluster demand for chips from automakers. (WSJ)

The U.S. economy accelerated to 2.8% growth in the second quarter as consumers increased spending and businesses ramped up inventory stocking. (WSJ)

Durable goods orders in the U.S. increased 0.5% last month, excluding a big decline in volatile transportation orders. (MarketWatch)

Cold-storage giant Lineage raised $4.4 billion in its initial public offering, the biggest new listing of the year. (WSJ)

Union Pacific’s second-quarter freight revenues edged up 1% as growing intermodal volume offset a 22% drop in coal and renewables carloads. (Dow Jones Newswires)

California’s top court ruled Uber, Lyft and other gig-economy companies can continue to use the independent contractor model. (WSJ)

Apollo Global Management is buying British parcel delivery company Evri for about $3.5 billion. (Sky News)

Kroger and Albertsons are pausing their $25 billion merger until a Colorado court rules on the state's lawsuit to block the deal. (WSJ)

Nestle cut its full-year sales outlook after it slowed the pace of price hikes amid pushback from cash-strapped shoppers. (WSJ)

Consumer-goods supplier Unilever projects underlying sales growth between 3% and 5% this year. (WSJ)

The U.S. plans to decide by Aug. 2 whether to classify Vietnam as a market economy. (Bloomberg)

Workers at Amazon’s San Bernardino, Calif., air hub staged a one-day strike over what they said were unfair labor practices. (San Bernardino Sun)

Cook Islands is the world’s fastest growing ship registry as the tiny nation embraces “dark fleet” tankers operating for Russia. (Lloyd’s List)

CMA CGM’s second-quarter profit fell 50% even as revenue and volume expanded 6.8%. (Journal of Commerce)

Maersk Line will declare general average on a vessel that caught fire off the Indian coast, as firefighters battled the blaze for a sixth day. (The Loadstar)

Container throughput at Spain’s Port of Valencia surged 65% in the first half of the year on growing volume from Red Sea shipping diversions. (Port Technology)

DB Schenker’s first-half revenue fell 6.6% while the freight forwarder’s operating profit declined 16.9% to about $10.2 billion. (Air Cargo News)

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• 🎧 Listen to PepsiCo’s sustainability chief detail the beverage and food giant’s regenerative agriculture investment and the journey to make its Lays chips sustainable from end to end.

Paul Page is editor of WSJ Logistics Report. Reach him at paul.page@wsj.com.

Follow the WSJ Logistics Report team: @PaulPage, @bylizyoung and @pdberger. Follow the WSJ Logistics Report on X at @WSJLogistics.