Rate Volatility, AI Vetting, and Telematics Overload | WHAT THE TRUCK?!?

Malcolm Harris (0:30)

Ladies and gentlemen, it is almost the third Saturday in October, so you know I had to come with the preparations. I can't even get my words out, I'm so excited. It's another episode of What The Truck. I'm your host, Malcolm Harris. It is Friday, October 16th, and we have such an incredible array of guests for you all. Bringing out the guy, well, really, he's the dude. All right, he is none other than my brother. He is the man. He is the myth. He is the legend. He is Mr. Michael Vincent. Mike, what is up, my brother? Welcome, it is good to see you on this Elustrious Friday. Come on, man.

Michael Vincent (1:17)

I love it, bro. What's up, dog? How are you, man? What goes down on the third Saturday of October every year? Tell me.

Malcolm Harris (1:24)

Listen, man, you got one or two options.

Michael Vincent (1:27)

It's got to have something to do with those volunteers.

Malcolm Harris (1:30)

Those volunteers out of Tennessee. All right. You got, are you a cigar guy at all?

Michael Vincent (1:36)

I used to be, man.

Malcolm Harris (1:37)

Yeah.

Michael Vincent (1:37)

I used to be. Not in years, but I've threatened, but my wife threatens back.

Malcolm Harris (1:42)

Okay. Okay.

Michael Vincent (1:43)

That's fine.

Malcolm Harris (1:44)

Happy wife. Happy wife.

Michael Vincent (1:46)

Happy life.

Malcolm Harris (1:46)

I get that.

Michael Vincent (1:47)

Amen, bro. Amen.

Malcolm Harris (1:48)

The winner of this game always smokes a cigar after. So last night, I went and picked up-

Michael Vincent (1:52)

What are you playing?

Malcolm Harris (1:53)

We're playing the University of Alabama.

Michael Vincent (1:56)

Oh.

Malcolm Harris (1:56)

Tennessee's Biggest Rival. Yeah.

It's the third Saturday in October.

Michael Vincent (2:00)

Come on now. Come on now. This is cake walk.

Malcolm Harris (2:04)

Oh, you think Alabama's taking it?

Michael Vincent (2:06)

No, hell no.

Malcolm Harris (2:08)

You don't think so?

Michael Vincent (2:08)

Are you at home?

Malcolm Harris (2:10)

Yeah, we're in Knoxville.

Michael Vincent (2:12)

No, no, no, no, no. Volunteers. What's the line? What's the line on the game?

Malcolm Harris (2:16)

Eight and a half.

Michael Vincent (2:18)

Yoshi taking it. Or Yoshi.

What's his name? Shohei. Shohei. Yoshi.

Malcolm Harris (2:26)

Yoshi? We need a meme of a...

Michael Vincent (2:29)

Yoshi. Yoshi Otani's gonna take it.

Malcolm Harris (2:32)

We need a meme of Yoshi from Mario Kart and a Shohei Otani.

Steve Schwindt (2:35)

That is too hard.

Malcolm Harris (2:37)

We don't need anything else for the rest of the day, man. That was hilarious.

Michael Vincent (2:41)

That's it. We're out.

Steve Schwindt (2:42)

We're out. The road ahead. We're out.

Malcolm Harris (2:44)

The road ahead, buddy. I mean...

Michael Vincent (2:46)

Dude, I figured out... I used to... When I travel, I used to find... There was a place in Guatemala City that I could buy Cuban cigars, right? And people who travel around South America, Central America, probably, you know, they're like, duh. But most people didn't, and I found it interesting. You buy a box of Cuban cigars and they will re-wrap it in Nicaraguan rappers and then present it to you at your gate when you fly out, right? So I used to do that. And then in my bag, I accidentally forgot a couple cojibas in my bag. I didn't realize that they were there. And I went through customs and the guy saw them and just put them back in there and didn't say shit. So I would buy a box of Cubans or a couple boxes of Cubans and just leave them empty, like the individual wrapped cigars in my luggage. When I opened it, I'd see two or three and close it. They don't give a shit about two or three. They give a shit about like 15 or a pallet. You know what I mean?

I used to bring Cubans back all the time.

Malcolm Harris (3:41)

So you were a Cuban Nicaraguan masked cigar smuggler.

Michael Vincent (3:47)

I was a mule. I was a cigar mule.

Malcolm Harris (3:49)

So basically, Phil Brink needs to make a story about you, is what we're saying.

Michael Vincent (3:53)

Yeah, I guess it was air cargo fraud, according to him.

Malcolm Harris (3:59)

Oh, man.

You are a mess. Today is going to be a fun day. I can already tell in the first four minutes. Let's get to on deck.

Michael Vincent (4:08)

It's Friday, bro.

Malcolm Harris (4:09)

Let's do it. We got some wonderful folks coming up, looking on deck to see who we have. It's going to be a total of three, like I mentioned. The first is going to be Mr. Juan Perez. Now, Juan, he is a Senior Director of Trading at Monex USA. All right, so he's joining us to break down why rate hikes aren't automatically making currency stronger. He was Bloomberg's top G10 FX forecaster for Q2 in 2026 So Juan, he's not going to say he's a big deal. Juan's a big deal, ladies and gentlemen. All right, and he's going to explain how currency swings are quietly eating into freight and shipper margins, then also why companies shouldn't try to predict things and what hedging actually does and what a CFO should do first. All right, so that's Juan's conversation. And then Alex Pugachov, he is the VP of Growth and Communication at Ovn LLC, and he's joining us to talk about Verilane. All right, it's the AI carrier qualification system, that Ovn has built for its own fleet of more than 1,300 cargo vans. All right, so it's going to read a driver's whole file. It's going to verify insurance directly with the provider instead of trusting a certificate. And it keeps rechecking coverage after onboarding. So we're going to dig into where AI stops and where a human steps in. And then how cutting onboarding time, roughly in half, helps both Ovn and its drivers. So that's the conversation with Alex.