bpost: “third quarter results demonstrate we are on track”

bpost has released its third quarter results, saying they are in line with expectations and on track for 2019 outlook.

• Group operating income +0.9% compared with the same period last year and at EUR 881.5 million
• Group reported EBIT at EUR 34.3 million. Normalised EBIT at EUR 38. million (margin of 4.3%)

Mail & Retail

• Total operating income at EUR 486.0 million (-1.6%) as mail volume decline was partly compensated by pricing.
• Underlying mail volume decline at -7.8% driven mostly by transactional mail due to
  e-substitution.
• Reported EBIT at EUR 38.5 million. Normalised EBIT at EUR 38.4 million (7.9% margin), down by 26.4% from mail volume decline and wage drift.

Parcels & Logistics Europe & Asia

• Total operating income +6.1% in comparison with the same period last year at EUR 198.3 million with Parcels BeNe up 18.8% and organic growth in E-commerce logistics.
• bpost continues to grow as operational partner of choice leading to strong Parcels BeNe volume growth at +20.3% resulting from e-commerce growth and good volume development at the Dutch subsidiary Dynalogic.
• Reported EBIT at EUR 9.7 million. Normalised EBIT at EUR 10.4 million (5.2% margin). Solid EBIT margin improvement thanks to the run-off of non-performing businesses and EUR 1.7 million DynaGroup earn-out reversal.

Parcels & Logistics North America

• As anticipated, total operating income at EUR 241.4 million (-0.1%) impacted by Radial customer churn and repricing compensated by new business and a positive FX evolution.
• Reported EBIT at EUR -8.6 million, normalised EBIT at EUR -5.3 million (-2.2% margin) mainly impacted by top-line development in line with expectations.

Koen Van Gerven, CEO, commented: “We are more than ever focused on implementing our strategy to remain an efficient provider of mail while growing in the promising e-commerce logistics space in Europe and North-America. These third quarter results demonstrate that we are on track, they are in line with our expectations and provide us comfort towards achieving our full-year guidance. The positive development in Parcels & Logistics Europe & Asia was supported by strong parcels volume growth in our home base, Belgium and the Netherlands, and by organic growth in e-commerce logistics. In North America, we continued our commercial progress but are, as anticipated, still impacted by prior client churn and repricing of 2018. As foreseen, Mail & Retail is still under pressure from e-substitution and wage drift. We are making good progress on concretising our alternating distribution model that will be implemented as of March next year. In light of the structural mail volume decline driven by changing customer needs, we need to adapt the way we operate to stay relevant in the future. This can only be done through the strong daily commitment of all our employees, whom I’d like to thank warmly for their hard work.”