Could You Have Seen The Run In CSX Stock Coming? Trefis Team Thu, November 12, 2026 at 2:44 PM EST 4 min read CSX +1.09% ^GSPC -0.31% UNP +0.74% NSC +0.84% CNI +0.07% Explore stocks on Coinbase Trading disclosure Trading disclosure The above button links to Coinbase. Yahoo Finance is not a broker-dealer or investment adviser and does not offer securities or cryptocurrencies for sale or facilitate trading. Coinbase pays us for certain activity generated through this link. Prices displayed are informational.
For questions about this article or underlying research, email help@trefis.com.
CSX stock returned 49.7% in the year to November 11, 2026, against 12.8% for the S&P 500. The shares were already rising before that year began, up 16.8% in the six months before it, so anyone who saw this coming had to see it early. Other railroads rose too, but CSX did better: after a weak 2025, the company moved more freight and kept more of its revenue as operating profit. So when did the first sign of that recovery show up?
On its first-quarter call, held April 16, 2025, management called it a difficult quarter for the network and said it was taking actions to stabilize operations and improve efficiency. The figures showed the damage. Operating margin, the share of revenue left after operating costs, fell to 30.4% in the quarter ended in March 2025, from 35.7% in the quarter ended in December 2024. Revenue in the March 2025 quarter was down 7.0% from a year earlier. That made the April call a sign worth watching: management named the problem and the fix while the margin was down, so each later quarter would show whether the fix was working.
By October 2025, CSX's Revenue Fall Had Nearly Closed
The next earnings call, held July 23, 2025, added results to that promise. Management said network performance had "bounced back from the challenges of the first quarter", and the operating margin for the quarter ended in June 2025 recovered to 35.9%. Revenue was still falling, but by less than it had in March. Revenue declined 3.4% from a year earlier in the June 2025 quarter, followed by a 0.9% drop in the quarter ended in September 2025.
The September 2025 quarter was less clean. On October 16, 2025, CSX reported lower revenue and profit amid lower export coal prices and a decline in merchandise volume. Operating margin slipped to 34.9% that quarter, below the 37.4% of the same quarter in 2024. So a reader in early November 2025 could see a network that had recovered and a revenue decline that had nearly closed, but a margin still short of where it had been a year earlier. That looked like a turn under way, not a finished one, and by then the board had also removed its chief executive, a change shareholder Ancora said followed shareholder feedback.
CSX Kept More Of Each Sales Dollar By 2026
In the twelve months to September 2026, CSX's operating margin was 36.6%, against 34.3% in the twelve months before. Operating income for the whole company reached $5.47 billion over those twelve months, against $4.84 billion a year earlier. Revenue grew as well, though management said on the October 21, 2026 call that fuel contributed about half of the third-quarter increase. Over the year to November 11, 2026, other railroads rose too: Union Pacific by 37.8%, Canadian National Railway by 38.2% and Norfolk Southern by 17.2%. So part of CSX's gain came with the rail group, and CSX still finished ahead of all three.
Is CSX Still Widening Its Margin?
Yes, through the quarter ended in September 2026. CSX's operating margin rose from 36.0% in the quarter ended in March 2026 to 38.3% in the June quarter. It climbed again during the September quarter, reaching 39.1%. Not every service measure improved, however: management said one intermodal service measure, trip plan compliance, declined in the third quarter.
On the October 21, 2026 call, management said it expects the fourth-quarter margin to improve by more than 350 basis points from a year earlier. Management also said costs usually rise from the third quarter to the fourth, and that over the last three to five years the margin has fallen by 200 to 300 basis points between the two. CSX's operating margin for the fourth quarter of 2026 is the number to watch when the company is expected to report in January 2027.
Does This Mean You Should Act On CSX?
Betting on a single stock is always risky, whichever way you lean. The Trefis High Quality (HQ) Portfolio holds 30 quality companies in equal weight and has returned 105% since its September 2020 launch.
Spot an error or want more like this? Tell us in 10 seconds.
