PostNL stock drops after profit warning | Photo credit: PostNL
Oct 21 (Reuters) – PostNL shares fell more than 10% on Friday after the Dutch postal company said it did not expect to meet its full-year guidance for normalized profit and free cash flow.
PostNL said it expects revenue to be lower than its previous estimate for the third quarter, namely 709 million euros against 729 million the previous year.
The group also forecasts a loss of normalized Ebit (earnings before interest and taxes) of 20 million euros and negative free cash of -49 million euros, compared to a positive flow of 10 million euros last year. .
The expected return to growth in parcel volumes did not materialize in the third quarter, PostNL said.
Volumes in the fourth quarter are expected to match those seen in 2021, the group added, making it the strongest quarter of the year and the “key driver of annual performance”.
“We believe that the worse-than-expected outlook for parcels leaves additional room to revise our estimates downwards,” says KBC Securities, adding that previous forecasts for parcel volumes were too optimistic.
Since the beginning of the year, the PostNL share has lost 60%.
The share of Bpost, the Belgian counterpart of PostNL, fell by around 7%. (Report Elena Vardon; French version Dagmarah Mackos, edited by Kate Entringer)