The commercial vehicle manufacturer Daimler trucks was able to increase sales despite falling sales in the third quarter. Revenue increased by 3 percent year-on-year to 13.9 billion euros, the DAX group announced on Tuesday in Leinfelden-Echterdingen near Stuttgart. Earnings before interest and taxes adjusted for special effects rose by 5 percent to 1.34 billion euros. Analysts had previously expected slightly more for both values. The share fell by almost 4 percent on Tuesday.
The operating margin in the industrial business, which is widely regarded by experts – i.e. excluding financial services – rose by 0.4 percentage points to 9.8 percent. However, incoming orders continued to collapse; orders were received for 99,070 vehicles, a 27 percent decrease. At 957 million euros, the consolidated profit was almost as high as the year before at 990 million euros.
As already known, Daimler Truck sold 128,861 vehicles between July and September. That was a minus of 5 percent. Management attributed the decline primarily to bottlenecks at suppliers. “Despite a volatile environment,” CEO Martin Daum (64) confirmed the annual outlook.
After the boom of recent years, the truck manufacturer Daimler Truck expects weaker demand in Europe and North America in 2024. “We will see a slight decline in the market, but we are going from a red-hot to a good market,” Daum said on Tuesday.
After there was a backlog of orders due to a lack of parts during the Corona pandemic, with high demand and long waiting times, business is now normalizing. Daimler Truck is expecting a “very solid” year with good profitability, emphasized Daum. Daimler’s competitor Volvo expects significantly lower sales in Europe and North America next year.
So far, the weak economy has hardly been able to slow down demand in the cyclically dependent commercial vehicle business. Manufacturers are still working through the backlog of orders from the pandemic.