At the beginning of the year, the sports car manufacturer Porsche AG compensated for rising costs with higher sales prices. Because the car manufacturer, which is majority owned by the VW Group, sold significantly more cars than in the same period last year, which was characterized by Covid lockdowns and a shortage of parts, Porsche boss Oliver Blume (54) was able to report a significant increase in business figures overall on Wednesday. Both higher sales prices and a shift towards more expensive models contributed to this, it said. The Stuttgarters are therefore sticking to their annual goals.
As already announced, Porsche had in the three months of January to March delivered the record number of 80,767 vehicles to customers, an increase of 18 percent. A year earlier, supply chain issues and the Covid pandemic slowed sales. Sales rose by 25.5 percent year-on-year to EUR 10.1 billion. The average sales price per car climbed from 107,000 euros in the same period last year to 116,000 euros now. Overall, according to the company, demand remained strong. The incoming orders in the first quarter were above the company’s expectations, CFO Lutz Meschke said in a conference call.
The consolidated operating result grew at about the same rate as sales by 25.4 percent to 1.84 billion euros. On average, analysts had calculated a little more. As in the previous year, the operating margin was 18.2 percent. The costs for energy, materials, raw materials and logistics rose, as did sales and administration. Net profit increased by 39 percent to 1.41 billion euros. In financial services, the results at the beginning of the year were not as strong as they were a year ago. Higher refinancing costs had a negative impact, and in view of the higher interest rates, a smaller proportion of car buyers concluded a financing agreement. However, the proportion should stabilize in the coming quarters, said Meschke.
“The markets remain volatile around the world – we are all the more satisfied with our figures,” said CFO Meschke. In the first quarter, the delivery problems were not quite over, especially in the supply chains and with the availability of parts for electric cars, there were above-average problems, according to Porsche. Even parts specially ordered by customers for personalizing the cars were sometimes still difficult to obtain.
The paper has developed splendidly for investors since the mega IPO in September last year. Having gone public for an issue price of EUR 82.50, the share price has since risen by almost a third to EUR 108 most recently. The company has long been rated higher by investors on the stock exchange than the entire Volkswagen Group.
However, the results from the first quarter are “a bit weak,” wrote analyst Philippe Houchois from the investment bank Jefferies about the Porsche figures. The market expected a little more operating profit and more free cash flow. However, there are no surprises in the figures. The Porsche AG preferred share listed in the Dax recently fell by 0.5 percent.
Porsche intends to continue increasing prices in the future
Porsche also wants to keep turning the price screw. In the USA, the group has heralded price increases of between four and eight percent, which should take effect in the second half of the year, said Meschke. Price developments are likely to remain strong for the remainder of the year.
Before the IPO, Blume had promised the financial markets to grow significantly over the coming years and also offered investors the prospect of driving the operating return on sales to over 20 percent in the long term. In order to achieve this, the management around Blume and Meschke have announced a new efficiency program, which should, however, do without job cuts. Also with new models and own batteries
Blume and Head of Development Michael Steiner want to take Porsche to the next level.