Car-Mart earnings up 40.8%, beat expectations

Bentonville-based America’s Car-Mart continued its impressive string of financial results during Arkansas’ economic downturn, posting fourth-year and year-end results well beyond expectations.

For the period ended April 30, the Bentonville used-car dealer reported net income of $7.22 million, or 62 cents per share, on revenue of $88.8 million. That compares with net income of $5.11 million, or 43 cents per share, on sales of $77.9 million a year ago. Overall, Wall Street had expected the Bentonville-based car dealer to report fourth quarter net income of 59 cents per share on revenue of $88.1 million, according to analysts polled by Thomson Reuters.

“We are very pleased with our top and bottom line growth for the most recent quarter and our full fiscal year,” William "Hank" Henderson, America’s Car-Mart president and CEO, said in a statement. "The five new dealerships opened in 2010 are performing very well and, with same store revenue increases of 11.8% for the quarter and 11.2% for the year, we are realizing the significant growth opportunities that we have been discussing for some time now."

For the year, Arkansas auto dealer’s net income jumped 50% from $17.9 million to $26.8 million on total revenue of $339 million, a 13.4% sales improvement from $299 million in 2009.

The company also announced that its board of directors had reauthorized the purchase of up to 1 million shares of the company’s buyback program last amended and approved in late February. So far, the company’s executive team has bought back nearly 487,000 shares of its common stock, representing ownership of 4.1% of America’s Car Mart outstanding shares.

Here are some other highlights of the company’s quarterly and year-end financial results:
• For the year, retail unit sales increase of 12.2% to 32,196 from 28,698 for the prior year.
• Strong cash flows supporting significant increase in revenues, $2.7 in net capital expenditures, $10.9 million in common stock re-purchases with only a $3.6 million increase in debt.
• The active customer base now more than 47,000.
• The provision for credit losses was 20.2% of sales vs. 21.5% for the prior year.

Car-Mart shares (NASDAQ: CRMT) were up more than 1.6% (around $24.90) in morning trading. During the past 52 weeks the share price has ranged from a $27.32 high to a $16.09 low.