GM Inside News Forum banner

Fiat Chrysler Q1 profit increases on Europe rebound, Maserati surge

2K views 28 replies 11 participants last post by  Rocket 88 
#1 ·
http://europe.autonews.com/article/20170426/ANE/170429888/fiat-chrysler-q1-profit-rises-on-europe-rebound-maserati-surge

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles' first-quarter earnings rose 11 percent as the company continued its shift away from sedans to more profitable SUVs and pickups.

FCA said adjusted first-quarter earnings before interest and taxes jumped to 1.54 billion euros ($1.67 billion) from 1.38 billion euros a year earlier. The carmaker on Wednesday confirmed targets for 2017, including at least 7 billion euros in adjusted Ebit.

Earnings were fueled by surging profits at the upscale Maserati brand and improved performance in Europe. Bolstered by the new Levante SUV, Maserati’s earnings jumped to 107 million euros from 16 million euros a year earlier.

Profit at the group’s once-struggling European operations almost doubled to 178 million euros as the new Alfa Romeo Giulia sedan and Stelvio SUV and the budget Fiat Tipo helped the carmaker grab market share. In contrast to a decline in its U.S. deliveries, Fiat Chrysler sold 15 percent more vehicles during the quarter in Europe, where the car market reached a record for March.

In North America, where the company makes about 80 percent of its profits, FCA posted adjusted earnings of 1.24 billion euros ($1.35 billion), up slightly from 1.23 billion euros during the same quarter last year. North American revenue dropped slightly to 17.10 billion euros from 17.14 billion euros. The gains came even as shipments dropped 6 percent amid the phase out of the Dodge Dart compact and Chrysler 200 sedan and the ramp-up of the new Jeep Compass SUV. Adjusted margins in North American ticked up to 7.3 percent from 7.2 percent, FCA said.

CEO Sergio Marchionne is putting his search for a merger on the back burner to work on eliminating Fiat Chrysler’s debt before he retires in 2019. Ever since General Motors rebuffed his approach for a combination in 2015, Marchionne has focused on debt reduction to make the carmaker a more attractive partner down the road. He told investors in mid-April that the company needs to avoid “unrealistic dreams” of a merger soon.

...
 
See less See more
#3 ·
https://seekingalpha.com/article/4065765-fiat-chrysler-automobiles-nv-fcau-q1-2017-results-earnings-call-transcript?part=single

Richard Keith Palmer - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV
...
I'll move on to page 4. We have an update on the launch process globally for two of our key new products. On the Alfa Romeo side, the Stelvio crossover was launched at the European Geneva International Auto Show. We're launching it in EMEA now in Q1. We will launch it in the NAFTA region in Q2 and then in Q3 in Asia Pacific. Shipments in the quarter were limited to about 3,000 units, but we have over 10,000 orders at the end of March. And the initial reaction in the marketplace and with the industry press and commentators has been very positive. This vehicle comes off the same platform, as you know, as the Alfa Romeo Giulia.


The Compass is being launched globally. We're completing the global industrialization in all regions. It's being commercially launched now in NAFTA in Q1 and will be launched in Europe in Q2, having already been launched in Latin America and Asia Pacific. Q1 shipments of this vehicle worldwide were 32,000 units with 5,000 in EMEA – sorry, in NAFTA, and the remainder in Latin America and Asia Pacific.

We also showed a concept vehicle at the SEMA Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the Chrysler Portal concept, which is the result of a collaboration with a number of supplier partners and is working towards looking at the interpretation of family transportation with next-generation autonomy and electrification.

...

Massimo Vecchio - Mediobanca Banca di Credito Finanziario SpA

Okay. Is it fair to ask you break-even volumes for the Alfa brand? Or...

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

It's not in the 230,000 number that Richard mentioned to you about as a combined number between Alfa and Maserati for 2017. We're still losing money at this level.

Massimo Vecchio - Mediobanca Banca di Credito Finanziario SpA

Okay.

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

That was part of the plan. It was clearly understood that the work that was being done on Alfa was designed to deal with more than just Alfa in the medium- to long-term. And effectively all the Maserati and the Dodge developments hinge on a proper execution of the Alfa strategy. So give it time. I think by 2018 we'll see much better numbers.

Massimo Vecchio - Mediobanca Banca di Credito Finanziario SpA

All right. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Richard, the conservative over here, says he's going to make money in Q4 with Alfa. So I'm just going to shut up and wait for him to deliver the numbers. I think it sounds reasonable to me, but for the year we won't be.

...

John Murphy - Bank of America-Merrill Lynch

But just to press you on this just a little bit. I mean could something like the Portal be out from Fiat Chrysler in the next year or two years in conjunction with a partnership with an LG Chem type of company?

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Yes.

...

George Galliers - Evercore ISI

Yeah. Good morning or good afternoon. First question I had was just on Maserati. Clearly a very strong performance, but the margin is still short of your 15% target for next year. The question I had is, can you get closer to the 15% with your existing product lineup? And should we expect further progression through 2017? And also what will drive this? Is it leverage on higher volumes, product mix, market mix, pricing, or other factors?

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

I think we're done on pricing on Maserati. I'm not sure there's much to be extracted. I think it is really penetration of the markets. We're beginning quite an intense distribution process across the globe. You've seen from the numbers in Q1 that they don't reflect the full year capacity in Maserati. I think we're targeting about 60,000 cars for 2017. And as you well know, operating leverage in this business is huge and so margin accretion is simply due to volume growth. And it's due to the fact that I think the distribution will widen as we get better.

We just launched now effectively into the U.S. in an effective way with the Levante. There's a couple of model year changes that are coming through for both the Quattroporte and the Ghibli, so we were able to extend the GranTurismo and the GranCabrio for an additional year. And the GranCabrio will extend beyond 2018, too. So I think we feel better about the product portfolio. We continue to work on its renewal, and this ties back into the discussion that we've had about Alfa earlier. This is crucial in terms of the next phase for Maserati. I think having done the Giulia and Stelvio, I think we're going to be in a much better position to move that brand forward.

...

Rod Lache - Deutsche Bank Securities, Inc.

If you could just clarify one thing on Europe, just broadly aside from what's happening from these regulatory authorities, there's been a broader decline in diesel demand within Europe. And is that having any impact on your compliance strategy or spending plans going forward?

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Well, Rod, there's not a single doubt that the cost of compliance with the diesel emission limits on smaller segments, whether A and B segments, is going to make diesel absolutely cost prohibitive for anybody who is in the market. And to the extent that we are active with repondos (50:48), the Fiat 500s and so on in that segment, we need to be very, very careful that we don't think we can continue to rely on our 1.3 liter diesel as providing a solution. It will be way too expensive.

And so obviously, it's changed – it has changed our compliance strategy because we are going to have to rely on a combination of gas and something else, which is a mild form of electrification to get us over the hump.

...

Martino De Ambroggi - Equita SIM SpA

Thank you. Good morning, good afternoon, everybody. I'd like to follow up on LATAM activity. Thinking about the divisional performance, I don't know if you agree, it seems to be the most difficult, the most challenging division target for – to be achieved in 2018. So what's the full-year 2017 performance, which would provide you enough visibility to achieve the 7% adjusted EBIT target in 2018?

Richard Keith Palmer - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Well I think, Martino, we're obviously – we're managing the target on the full portfolio, that you're right, as the market stands today, the LATAM target looks pretty tough. I think we are pleased with the performance of Jeep in Latin America and the impact it's having on our mix. We are working to continue to have an appropriate cost level for the level of the market today, and I think as compared to competition we've been performing well, notwithstanding that we've been around break-even for the last few quarters.

Going forward, I think the key for us is to position well, Jeep, which we're doing, maintain our position in the pickup segments with Strada and with the new pickup out of Pernambuco, and be ready for when the market starts to give some indications of improvement. As I said earlier, we've seen some year-over-year improvements in annual sales – daily sales, sorry, in the last 30 days. And so I think there is some improved confidence. Interest rates have come down. I think consumers are more active, and so we'll continue to manage the business towards the best performance we can get to.

We don't need to get LATAM to the levels that we wrote down to get to the business plan overall, because I think on the other side, as we just talked about, components are doing – are performing strongly, EMEA is performing strongly with a market that is performing better than our original forecast, and the North America plan is underway with strong performance expected in 2018 from the new Wrangler, the new light-duty Ram, et cetera, and margins getting up to where our competition is.

So I think plus the luxury and premium brands, we obviously built some level of overall contingency into our plan so that we could manage one of the operating segments underperforming, and at the moment the most likely candidate is Latin America, not that we're giving up there, but I think overall, we're still confident of getting to our 2018 targets.

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Just to make sure that whoever's listening to the call, and including people down in Latin America, there's absolutely no intention of giving up on the 7% target for 2018. I mean the reason why we invested in Pernambuco was to effectively allow that business to field roughly 250,000 cars out of 750,000 in Latin America, or at least out of the Brazilian operations, and margins, which were substantially higher than the historical run rate that we were getting out of Fiat as a brand. And that process has begun to deliver. We're only running slight – in excess of 100,000 cars now out of that plant.

So we're about 40% of the way there. And I think we need to see the full deployment of the production capacity in Pernambuco before we call it a day in terms of margins. So I think 7% is still doable, but I also agree with Richard that when the plant was put together, there were enough bumpers that were put around the numbers to make sure that in case we caught a cold in a particular jurisdiction, we'd be able to offset it. So the number is within reach, one way or the other, for the group.

...

Patrick Hummel - UBS AG

All right. Okay. And my second question, a month ago, Mr. Müller from Volkswagen was asked whether he spoke with you recently about potential combinations, et cetera.

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Whatever he told you, I have not spoken to him.

Patrick Hummel - UBS AG

Right. That was my question, basically. You have reached out in the meantime?

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

No, I have not.

Patrick Hummel - UBS AG

Or you're planning to speak to him? Because he's clearly – he wasn't very clear in his answer, and he seemed to be sort of interested to have a conversation.


Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Well, maybe we will have one. But right now, I've just been busy delivering the best quarter in our history. So I think if I had to make a choice between delivering these numbers or talking to Matthias, I'll deliver these numbers any day.

Patrick Hummel - UBS AG

All right. Thank you.

...

Dominic O'Brien - Exane Ltd.

Thank you. And then secondly, just specifically on your capacity realignment plans, when production of the new light duty Ram and Jeep Wrangler starts in new plants next year, what happens to the current production sites, the supply park in Warren in 2018? Do those plants go on producing old models or is there going to be some idle periods throughout 2018 on those? Thank you.

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

I think that we're looking at – well, to begin with, as you well know, one of those sites, certainly the Warren plant, will be needed to produce one of the – one if not both of the Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer that are coming on the (72:36). So the plant is not going to go idle in the medium to long term.

The question that you asked about whether we're going to continue production on the old models for any – for long period of time is unclear to me. I think we're looking at this right now. I think the launch sequence of the new Ram 1500 is a very complicated product in terms of actual composition of models. It will take us a good 12 months to 18 months to roll out the full range of products that are encompassed by the 1500 nameplate. And I think the likelihood of us being able to extinguish the old Ram 1500 while that rollout happens is relatively small.

So we're playing the what-ifs right now. I think there's a better than 50% chance that Warren will run for some period of time, if not the whole of 2018 making the old model. But it's only to supplement the new one until the full rollout happens.

Dominic O'Brien - Exane Ltd.

Okay. Thank you. And the same with the Wrangler, can that continue throughout 2018 as the old model...?

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

We've got to be very – that's a different story, because I think the Wrangler will come – it undoubtedly will have extended production in some of its versions, but it's a lot easier for us to replace the Wrangler in its totality with the new installation than it is to replace the old 1500 with the new. Declining various versions of the two nameplates, Wrangler and 1500, is a lot easier to do it on the Wrangler than it is to do on the 1500. So I would expect it, and I think that's what's built into our plan. It's certainly within the first half of 2018, we will be decommissioning the old Wrangler and we'll begin work on the introduction of the pickup truck, which is coming up next.

Dominic O'Brien - Exane Ltd.

Thank you very much.
 
#4 ·
But, but, but, killing small cars and switching to crossovers was a mistake? Putting money into Alfa + Maserati was throwing it away? #sarcasm

Seems like old Sergio reacted to the market and made the right calls to me. If Maserati and Alfa start humming along, all of a sudden you have FOUR highly profitable brands under your umbrealla, when added to RAM and Jeep.
 
#7 ·
What complete rubbish. FCA builds the least reliable brands of cars sold in North America--Fiat and Jeep. Despite its poor record of reliability, Jeep is FCA's "goose that lays the golden egg." FCA's other success story is RAM. However, Jeep may soon lose its special status in the FCA pantheon. RAM too. FCA is now saying that Jeep and RAM are strong enough to stand alone.

In English, this means that FCA is looking to divest Jeep and RAM. Whether or not the divestiture ever happens, the message is clear: FCA is dismantling itself to gain a little more cash to carry on just a little longer. Of course, neither Jeep nor RAM is viable as a standalone brand. However, Jeep will be a fantastic addition to a manufacturer that does not now have a line of off-road vehicles. RAM's problem is that its CAFE as a standalone brand would be terrible. However, it would be a welcome addition to a manufacturer that is currently weak on light truck offerings.

The part of the OP that got my goat was the claim that Maserati is responsible for FCA's profits in Europe. In 2016, Maserati sold 12,534 cars in the USA and 7,904 cars in Europe across all models. Ignore for a minute the fact that Maserati volumes cannot account for a significant percentage of the FCA profits in Europe reported in the OP. Maserati volume is tiny. It is the very definition of a thin reed upon which to depend for profits.
 
#10 · (Edited)
FCA is now saying that Jeep and RAM are strong enough to stand alone.
Oh, you like click baits. Nice!

I posted a link to transcript from conference and IMO what are the most interesting parts. I excluded that part because it's completely irrelevant.

But here it is:

Adam Michael Jonas - Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC

Hi, everyone. Sergio, Jeep and Ram, are these businesses large enough, let's say together or separately, but large enough, strong enough, independent enough to exist as a standalone entity outside of FCA, like Ferrari?

Sergio Marchionne - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV

Yes.



So that was just a speculative question. Adam Michael Jonas almost always at FCA conference push for it.

But now AFAIK Jeep and Ram are parts of FCA US company. For example Alfa Romeo is a part of FCA Italy company. But Maserati is not part of them, it's a direct subsidiary of FCA. IMO, in the future same path will be applied for Jeep and Alfa Romeo. I'm not sure about Ram.

In that case we can see Jeep, Alfa and Maserati listed at Wall Street but they will be part of FCA. That would lead to cheaper loans for them.


The part of the OP that got my goat was the claim that Maserati is responsible for FCA's profits in Europe. In 2016, Maserati sold 12,534 cars in the USA and 7,904 cars in Europe across all models. Ignore for a minute the fact that Maserati volumes cannot account for a significant percentage of the FCA profits in Europe reported in the OP. Maserati volume is tiny. It is the very definition of a thin reed upon which to depend for profits.
Actually Maserati is not part of any region in financial reports. It stands alone. And by far the biggest market for Maserati is China. They are imported there from Italy. Levante is selling like a hot cakes there.

Maserati sales in Europe are healthier than in US. Incentives are not known for Maserati in Europe.

And Maserati is on track to sell around 55k cars this year. 55k expensive high margin cars.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top