WERDOHL (dpa-AFX) - German transport services firm Vossloh Group (VOSSF.PK) reported Thursday that its earnings before interest and taxes or EBIT amounted to 12.5 million euros, down from 21.0 million euros a year ago. EBIT margin amounted to 6.1 percent, compared to previous year's 9.1 percent.
Group sales of 205.1 million euros in the months from July to September were 11.3 percent below last year.
The results primarily reflected the temporarily weaker sales development in the Fastening Systems business unit in China.
Along with sales development in China, negative currency translation effects were also responsible for the sales decline compared to the previous year.
Vossloh Group's orders received were noticeably higher than in the previous year. After the first nine months of 2018, they amounted to 684.0 million euros, 4.8 percent above the previous year's period.
As of September 30, 2018, Vossloh Group's order backlog of 542.7 million euros was significantly above the figure of 494.8 million euros as of the previous year's reporting date.
Further, the company's guidance for 2018 confirmed and further detailed.
For the entire 2018 fiscal year, Vossloh expects Group sales to trend toward the lower end of the guidance of 875 million euros to 950 million euros.
EBIT and the EBIT margin will be below the previous year's figures, as expected at the beginning of the year. Vossloh assumes that the EBIT margin for 2018 will be at the lower end of the estimated range between 6.0 percent and 7.0 percent.
For 2019, higher sales in North America are continued to be assumed. The sales development in the high-margin focus market of China will depend in part on the customer's scheduling of deliveries of the orders expected to be received in the fourth quarter.
Copyright RTT News/dpa-AFX