21.02.2023

Strong finish for Manitowoc

US crane manufacturer Manitowoc has published its 2022 results, showing solid gains in revenues for both the full year and particularly the fourth quarter.

Full Year
The company, which includes the Grove, Potain and National Crane brands, posted full year revenues of $2.03 billion, up 18.2 percent on 2021. In spite of the strong increase in sales, the company reported a pre-tax loss of $120.2 million, compared to a small profit last year of $17.1 million. The reason being entirely due to a $171.9 million non-cash asset write down for intangibles. Without that the company would have achieved a $51.7 million profit.

Fourth Quarter
Moving on to the fourth quarter, revenues improved 24.9 percent to $621.6 million, outpaced by an order intake of $708 million, leaving the company with a backlog/order book of $1.06 billion - roughly six months of business. The net result was a loss of $139.8 million compared to a loss of $4.8 million once again due to the asset write down being taken mostly in the fourth quarter.
The company expects revenues for 2023 to come at roughly the same levels, possibly with a five percent improvement.

Chief executive Aaron Ravenscroft said: “The fourth quarter was a great end to a challenging year. The Manitowoc team delivered fourth quarter revenues of over $600 million, contributing to full year adjusted EBITDA margin of seven percent. I am proud of the team for these exceptional results and thank them for their hard work.”

“We have made significant progress in our CRANES+50 strategy, delivering non-new machine sales growth of over 20 percent year over year. We remain focused on our four breakthrough initiatives to unlock long-term shareholder value."

Vertikal Comment

This is a good set of results from Manitowoc, which is gaining some good momentum based on sales of its new products and the result of acquisitions such as H&E Equipment and other moves into direct sales and service operations.

What is surprising though is the modest forecast it has issued for 2023 suggesting that sales might be flat. Based on what we see in the market and the reception that most of its new products have received, we would have expected sales growth forecasts in the region of 10 percent - or more - to somewhere in the region of $2.25 billion. Especially as the 2022 numbers were negatively impacted by the strong US currency causing overseas revenues to translate to fewer dollars.

Interesting times - we may update this comment if an when we learn more.