Strong performance bolstered by commercial vehicles foretold through year
With commercial vehicle sales starting to nudge towards decade-high numbers, car and truck vendor AP Eagers is continuing to feel the strength.
November’s figures, which are likely to surface next week, will show how close that milestone is but Eagers is giving them credit for what it expects to be an annual profit of $135-$140 million.
Trucks have been the ‘ugly sister’ of the Eagers family of companies, especially compared with cars, but that looks set to change.
“This will be the company’s sixth record result in a row, and compares to 2015’s profit before tax of $121 million,” the company says in a recent trading update.
“This expected record result for 2016 is underpinned by our core, like for like, retailing operations maintaining their all-time record levels achieved in 2015.
“Record levels of trading in South Australia and the Hunter Region combined with significant improvement in our national truck division have helped to offset the decline in Queensland.
“Although 2016 will see Queensland achieve its second highest trading result on record, this follows the state’s extraordinary uplift in 2015 which resulted from the activity generated by the major hail storm event in south east Queensland.”
The bullish announcement follows a similar one from MD Michael Ward in August and May.