KARACHI: Sales of Honda Atlas Cars Ltd (HACL) soared by 57.5 per cent to Rs65.7 billion during April to December 2017, from Rs41.7bn in the same period of 2016.

However, sales in October-December 2017 surged by 38.7pc to Rs21.8bn from Rs15.7bn in the corresponding period in 2016.

Profit after tax in April-December 2017 stood at 5.12bn as compared to Rs4bn in corresponding period 2016. The company reported Rs1.4bn profit after tax in October-December 2017 as against Rs1.5bn in the same period 2016, indicating a slight fall in third quarter.

During nine months of the marketing year 2018, the earnings per share (EPS) rose to Rs35.9 against Rs28.12 a year ago.

Sales of Honda Civic, City and BRV have been going brisk owing to a rise in demand. The company’s other operating income in the first nine months of marketing year 2019 rose to Rs1.4bn. In the third quarter of marketing year 2018, the HACL reported other operating income of Rs460m compared to Rs312m in corresponding period in 2016.

Although, revenues were up 39pc, gross profits only rose by 4pc as gross margins shrunk 3.46 percentage points to 10.45pc. A car analyst attributed this to increasing steel prices. Margins were hampered by discounts given by the company on its BRV variants to its dealers.

The rupee’s fall against the dollar and the yen did not have any significant impact on company’s profitability due to nature of supplier contracts.

The company had raised prices of its variants with effect from January 2018 by 2pc to pass on the impact of devaluation and other cost to the consumers.

Published in Dawn, January 24th, 2018