10.03.2010

Haulotte looses €63 million

Haulotte has confirmed its 2009 revenues of €202 million and published its final result which shows a pre-tax loss of €63 million, compared to a profit of €50.6 million.

The news was not all bad though, the company has been cash positive and managed to reduce its net debt by €15 million to €239.7 million. The company has not published any further information so we will have to wait until April to see the annual report.

The company says that it expects 2010 to be similar to 2009 and that it will not pay a dividend for 2009.

As a reminder of the revenue break-downs for 2009:

Total full year revenues were €202 million, a fall of 55.2 percent compared to 2008. Equipment sales declined by 63.6 percent to €139.4 million, Service revenues, which include parts sales, fell by 11 percent and rental revenues by two percent -17 percent on a like for like basis which excludes the Access Rentals acquisition in the UK in mid 2009 and Horizon High Reach in Argentina in early 2008.

Geographically European sales fell by 63 percent to €139.9 million, North American revenues grew four percent to €33.8 million (of which €21.9 million came from BilJax), while Asia declined by 15 percent to €16.7 million or 8.3 percent of the total and South America fell 39 percent to €11.5 million or 5.7 percent of total revenues.

Vertikal Comment

Haulotte has adopted the habit of dribbling its financial information out in small bites, with revenues in February, profits in March and the rest on publication of the annual report in April, so it is quite challenging to do a proper analysis of the results at this stage.

The company appears to be doing no better and no worse than its top two competitors when it comes to the aerial lift and telehandler manufacturing and support business. It is hard to say much more at this stage.