Topic: Rosenbauer released strong preliminary Q4 figures with sales above and EBIT in line with our estimates. Even more importantly, the company announced a promising FY25e guidance pushing the stock up 9.5% last Friday on Vienna Stock Exchange.
Preliminary FY24 sales rose by 23% yoy to € 1,307m (eNuW: € 1,251m; guidance € 1,200m) and Q4'24 came in at € 466m (eNuW: € 410m) up 27% yoy. Alongside strong price increases (eNuW: c. 10% yoy in FY avg. price per fire truck) the topline was also driven by a 10% growth in vehicle deliveries for FY24.
As in the previous quarters, demand for Rosenbauer's firefighting technologies remained strong. Q4'24 order intake increased by 11.4% to € 472m leading to a new record high in order backlog of € 2.28bn (vs. € 1.79bn in FY23).
Preliminary FY24 EBIT rose by 74% to € 65.2m (eNuW: € 63.2m) with a solid 1.5pp margin improvement to 5.0% (eNuW: 5.0%) in line with the company's guidance. The seasonal strong Q4'24 EBIT came in at € 35.8m (eNuW: € 33.7m) up 36% yoy with a 7.7% margin (+0.5pp yoy).
Further, despite the strong sales growth, Rosenbauer successfully reduced its trade working capital from € 457m in FY23 (43% of sales) to € 424m due to lower inventories (eNuW: € 580m) and higher customer prepayments.
Strong FY25e outlook: Management expects sales of around € 1.50bn (eNuW new: € 1.52bn) with an EBIT margin north of 6% (eNuW: € 6.2%). In our view, price increases should be a significant contributor in FY25e for Rosenbauer's sales and EBIT growth. Remind you, there are still notable price increases embedded in the order book, as the average price per fire truck in order intake during 9M'24 increased by 14.6% yoy to € 571k (9M'23 +12.1% yoy) to cover the material price inflation (e.g. chassis prices increased c. 20% since 2021 to c. € 100-120t). With still elevated lead-times of two years in the US and 1.5 years for municipal trucks in Europe, we expect to see tailwind from price increases not only for FY25e but also in FY26e.
Wereiterate our BUY rating with a new PT of € 55 (old € 50), based on DCF.
ISIN: AT0000922554
