J.B. Hunt Transport Services announced third-quarter earnings that exceeded analysts’ expectations late Wednesday, resulting in a significant 11.9% surge in its stock during after-hours trading.
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The multimodal transport firm reported consolidated revenues of $3.05 billion, remaining stable compared to last year and slightly surpassing the $3.02 billion consensus estimate.
Nonetheless, efficient cost management led to an 8% increase in operating income year-over-year, and earnings per share rose by 18% to $1.76, which is 30 cents above what analysts were forecasting. (A favorable tax rate contributed an additional 3 cents to the EPS.)
Year-over-year margin improvements were observed across J.B. Hunt’s (NASDAQ: JBHT) intermodal, dedicated, and brokerage sectors, although final mile and truckload segments experienced slight declines.
Intermodal revenue decreased by 2% year-on-year as both load volumes and revenue per load saw minor reductions. (However, both metrics improved 3% on a sequential basis.)
The unit achieved a 91.8% operating ratio (the inverse of operating margin), reflecting a 100 basis point improvement compared to the previous year, and 150 bps better than the second quarter, thanks to better network efficiency and reduced empty moves.
Dedicated revenue saw a 2% year-over-year growth, driven by a 3% rise in revenue per truck weekly, slightly offset by a decrease in average truck count. This segment reported an operating ratio of 87.9%, which is an improvement of 80 bps year-on-year (with a sequential improvement of 100 bps).
The losses within the brokerage segment were reduced this quarter to $752,000.
J.B. Hunt will conduct a conference call at 5 p.m. EDT on Wednesday to further discuss the quarterly results.
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The article J.B. Hunt’s stock rises 12% following Q3 earnings beat first appeared on FreightWaves.
