Company Earnings

Manhattan Associates, Inc. held a call with investors to discuss its first quarter 2019 earnings results which were ahead of analysts’ forecasts on an adjusted basis.

SAP posted impressive growth in cloud revenue while avoiding a concomitant drop in licenses.

Canadian transportation company reports strong performance across businesses following record 2018.

Manhattan Associates, Inc. reported adjusted non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.41, $0.04 better year-over-year.

The company issued a soft outlook, predicting fiscal year 2019 all-in sales growth from in-line to up 1 percent versus 2018, including a negative impact of 3 to 4 percentage points from the combination of negative foreign exchange and a modest positive impact from acquisitions and divestitures.

Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE, Nasdaq: VZ) reported first quarter earnings per share (EPS) of $1.22 compared with $1.11 in the first quarter of 2018, and an adjusted EPS of $1.20 compared to $1.17 last year, defying analyst expectations.

With first quarter 2019 earnings set to kickoff on Monday, April 15, FreightWaves is looking at expectations for the transportation stocks.

Covenant Transport is the first enterprise carrier to lower guidance for Q1 on a numbers of headwinds, none of which are macroeconomic—yet.

After posting record earnings for the fourth quarter of 2018, the company is expecting its first quarter earnings to take a hit from lowered demand in the early months of 2019.

International terminal mega-operator, DP World, has announced a solid set of results for 2018. Revenues, earnings before interest taxation depreciation and amortization (EBITDA), and net profit all substantially increased last year compared to 2017. Acquisitions and increased box volumes drove revenues and profits. DP World has announced investment plans for 2019.

Revenues are falling at Roadrunner Transportation Systems, but management remains confident the company is heading in the right direction.

Member of THE Alliance is latest ocean carrier to experience financial difficulty amid a still volatile rate environment.

The credit metrics for XPO have weakened but are still good enough for a BB rating.

North America On-Highway and Defense softened sequentially, and management thinks the company will make much less money in 2019.

Expeditors should do well in a softening ocean freight market and a Panalpina deal wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing.

“We have a lot of reasons to believe 2019 will be our best ever.”

The transportation and logistics services company closed out 2018 with the highest quarterly revenue ever reported.

With the completion of the rights offering, the beleaguered carrier has a completely new capital structure.

A solid quarter, year despite decelerating sequential net revenue.

A solid year with more on tap for 2019, Atlas says.

Walmart’s latest earnings report beat analysts expectations today, with  e-commerce sales growing by 43 percent during the company’s fourth quarter.

Brambles, a supplier of reusable pallets, crates and containers for the supply chain industries, recorded strong revenue growth but its profit was much lower in the first half of its financial year, according to results released to the Australian Stock Exchange.

J.B. Hunt has closed its acquisition of Cory 1st Choice Home Delivery, adding the last-mile business to its Final Mile Services Division.

USX shifted its fleet away from over-the-road toward dedicated and lowered its adjusted operating ratio to 92.5%.

Today’s selloff on soft revenue growth guidance went too far, according to Stifel’s Bruce Chan and Susquehanna’s Bascome Majors.

Marten Transport and other public truckload companies could make a good stock investment if historical trends hold, says an analyst from Stephens.

Old Dominion’s operating ratio (OR) improved 520 basis points in the fourth quarter, moving from 83.9 percent to 78.7 percent year-over-year. This is the third quarter in a row the company has posted an OR under 80 percent.

ECHO pivoted away from the spot market and also leaned into LTL.

Werner Enterprises (NASDAQ: WERN) reported strong earnings in the fourth quarter of 2018, posting a diluted earnings per share (EPS) of $0.77. This topped analyst expectations, with the average estimate of 10 analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research coming in at $0.68.

The earnings were accompanied by a strong report from Cowen on the company’s outlook.

Not a gangbusters quarter for Saia or Schneider. But the numbers were strong for both and Merrill Lynch thinks the Schneider stock is undervalued.

Debt levels are down and EBITDA coverage for that debt is up as the LTL carrier has a strong year and quarter.

Schneider National (NYSE: SNDR) reported strong earnings again in the fourth quarter, beating analysts’ earnings per share (EPS) estimates of $0.46. The transportation giant posted adjusted diluted EPS of $0.49, up from 2017’s fourth quarter result of $0.33.

After a day of choppy trading, a consensus seemed to emerge that CHRW was well-positioned to grow net revenues even in a re-balancing freight market.

Asset-light transportation manager sees results in-line with expectations, but softer rates coming up ahead.

The company laid out its strategy in an SEC filing in the third quarter, and the fact that it is succeeding was evident in the numbers.

There aren’t too many signs of a slowdown in the class 8 order book, company officials said.

CHRW grew earnings per share by 24%, top line revenue by 4.5%; and net revenues by 13%.

The operating ratio in every trucking segment of the company was improved and its outlook for 2019 is solid also.

The still-high operating ratio came in for criticism while management says it will reveal all on February 11.

The numbers that have come out so far are showing few signs that there had been a significant fourth quarter slowdown.

The company moved up its operating ratio targets on the back of a strong performance in the early days of precision railroading.

It was a great quarter for the railroad with revenue growth in all its product lines and increases in both operating and net income.

Covenant Transport (NASDAQ: CVTI) reported record revenue in the fourth quarter, beating analyst projections by $10.72 million. The company announced $272.3 million in total revenue, a 33.9% increase compared to the fourth quarter of 2017.

Heartland continues its strategy of being willing to walk away from revenue if it isn’t profitable and it is showing in the company’s operating ratio.

A company that’s been doing it, a company that says it’s going to be doing it and a company that is being affected by others doing it: that was the theme on three calls about precision railroading.

Just a few months after its CEO expressed some skepticism about the practice, the NAFTA-focused rail company will adopt its principles.

Intermodal is about half the business. It saw its volumes decline but overall grew its revenue.

The company’s stock took it on the chin for much of 2018 but the company said it had a strong fourth quarter.

Analyst Bruce Chan at Stifel praises the reorganization at the company that suffered an accounting scandal and sees the base being laid for future growth.

The operating ratio—strong enough in the third quarter that it can be argued it was earth-shaking—weakened slightly but was still ahead of the fourth quarter of 2017.

Everyone knew the quarter was weaker than it had been. The question is how much. Stock prices have reflected a significant slowdown.

After first saying in November that operating ratio for the year would be flat, a strong December has enabled it to tick up slightly.

It’s an aggressive push by Deutsche to rebut the suggestion that XPO has serious accounting issues.

The formula for the rights offeirng could leave Elliott in control of more than 95% of the company’s outstanding common stock.

A number of analysts have stepped forward and issued counterarguments to a negative report on Thursday about XPO, and the company itself has announced a share buyback program.

XPO Logistics has disputed the content of a report from Spruce Point Capital Management, a noted short-seller of stocks, that claims XPO has “perpetuated a massive financial scheme on the public.”

Good times at U.S. ports not expected to last as world’s largest shipping line warns trade war will rear up at start of next year.

Its financial metrics were not strong, but management sees recapitalization as key to its future.

Also in the pickup: better tools for sleep apnea instruments in sleeper berths; does Buffet care about BNSF’ OR?

The company is not turning its back on acquisitions forever but thinks it needs to digest the heavy slate of companies it has bought since the middle of 2018.

ArcBest posted excellent operating results for the third quarter, but executives failed to clarify the company’s pension liabilities, which were the subject of a controversial short seller report last month.

The driver squeeze forced U.S. Xpress to shift resources from OTR to Dedicated. Still, it posted a healthy increase in its OR.

Less-than-truckload carrier plans to rejuvenate fleet and remain focused on price over volume.

Schneider National (NYSE: SNDR) reported strong third quarter earnings, announcing $1.3 billion in operating revenue, a 15 percent increase compared to the third quarter of 2017.

LTL carrier says Northeast expansion to continue with new facilities, but segment remains at breakeven results.

Some of the stocks that were getting hammered at midday recovered on the back of the broader market rebound by the close. One exception: Ryder.

Ryder System (NYSE: R) reported record total revenue and record operating revenue for the third quarter. Both total and operating revenue grew across all business segments, which the company attributed to new business and higher volumes.

There’s no particular pattern in seeing which stocks have declined significantly more than the drop in the overall S&P 500 index.

It was a better quarter for three companies representing different sectors: 3PL, intermodal and truckload.

OD’s top line revenue grew 21.2% year over year to $1.06B and earnings per share swelled 71% to $2.12. Even more impressively, Old Dominion achieved a 78.4% operating ratio, a company (and possibly industry) record and 280 bps improvement over Q3 2017.

The Unified Plan 2020 is in place in one corridor, with another to come. So far, UP executives are boasting about its success.

Tesla’s best quarter ever is a huge deal: a rich mix of high end Model 3s and lower capex helped. We still don’t think TSLA shares are rationally priced.

Daimler Trucks sold more vehicles in quarter three than a year ago, but its parent company, Daimler AG saw revenue flat for the third quarter at $45.8 billion (40.2 billion Euros).

Knight-Swift Transportation reported strong earnings on Wednesday, and it was immediately met with praise from Morgan Stanley analyst Ravi Shanker, who wrote in a note that the company’s stock is a “relative buy, at worst, in our view.”

UPS Inc. will expand its “My Choice” customized delivery program to the business-to-business segment during the first quarter of next year.

Although a full reveal of its strategy was not part of the conference call, the discussion of the “clean sheets” program shows that Norfolk Southern has undertaken a review of its operations on its way to how much of the precision railroading model it will adopt.

CEO David Parker expects very strong demand in Q4 and Covenant to shift further to dedicated capacity in 2019 in an effort to “get deeper into the supply chain.”

Crude-by-rail is big growth driver for quarter as rail remains key outlet for Canadian crude.

Revenue forecasts were reached only because of a one-time tax event. But by almost any other standard, it was a strong quarter.

Also in the pickup: IMO meets with 2020 on the horizon; Rhine levels are causing plants to shut down; C.R. England and its charitable cause

The usual signs of an upturn in the trucking sector aren’t there, according to the Wall Street house, and Morgan wonders if a lot of the demand got pushed forward.

One quarter ago, their earnings were feared to have marked a peak. But there’s no signs of that reading the third quarter numbers.

The CEO of Heartland defends the company’s strategy that saw a lot less revenue but a lot more in profits.

Also in today’s issue: a beating shows the dangers to truckers, even off the road; an Indian company looks to disrupt that company’s trucking sector.

A significant falloff in revenue went along with the rise in profitability as the operating ratio took a big leap forward.

A significant falloff in revenue went along with the rise in profitability as the operating ratio took a big leap forward.

Although some of its individual ORs were less than a year ago, the company said its 14-month record on OR is its best ever.

In her final conference call as CEO, PepsiCo’s Indra Nooyi presented their third-quarter results, once more pointing to transportation costs that threatened to eat into profits.

Transportation services firm misses first quarter estimates as company accelerates pay raises and bonuses.

A Norfolk Southern executive suggested that the company’s management will have a lot to talk about on its next quarterly earnings call.

Coverage of three companies were launched with a “buy” rating, while three of them got “hold” ratings.

HCI Equity Partners says in amended filing it may enter transaction to help Roadrunner’s balance sheet.

The growth for Walmart was strong across the board, but ecommerce and groceries were key contributors.

Seven acquisitions in the past year have nearly doubled Daseke Inc.’s topline revenue; Aveda Transportation in particular is a high-performing division commanding rich per-mile rates.

Workhorse Group, a technology company focused on offering sustainable mobility solutions, announced a new public offering of its common stock to raise additional funds as it works towards profitability.

The class 1 railroad owned by Berkshire Hathaway had the worst OR of any of the class 1 railroads for the second quarter.

Overall revenue at Roadrunner is up, but it remains burdened by high interest charges necessary to have given the company a strong capital base.

Revenue growth for the ocean and air 3PL was strong, but margins at Expeditors tightened.

In today’s pickup, CEOs on analysts calls don’t see a peak and see better driver retention for their companies. Also: OPEC output and a change in Chinese scrap policy.