LeasePlan Corporation, the parent company of LeasePlan UK, has today published its interim results for the first half of 2012.

The figures reveal that the company achieved net profit for the first six months of 2012 of 123 million euros – down from the same period in 2011 by 13 million euros.

It says that the difference is down to a one-off special income element of 30 million euros and one-off post-employment benefits that were included in the first half of 2011.

Vahid Daemi, chairman and CEO of LeasePlan Corporation, said: “When viewed against these items our profit level for 2012 remains consistent with the previous year’s first half results.

“Even though we could not qualify this any longer as ‘returning to pre-crisis performance’ as stated in previous reports, we can fairly say that LeasePlan’s results have over the past years proven to be rather ‘crisis-proof’.”

Daemi also says that compared to the first half of 2011 many economies in which the company operates are faring worse than a year ago.

This has impacted in the number of vehicles in the business, which has fallen from 1,328,000 vehicles as of December 2011, to 1,327,000 units as of June 2012.

“Despite the overall underlying result being stable and strong, some of the individual components do show variations,” explained Daemi.

“Total operating and net finance income decreased in the first half of 2012 compared to the same period in 2011 by 12 million euros (-2%).

“As previously mentioned, the main cause of the decrease is the one-off income element included in 2011 of 30 million euros regarding a settlement with tax authorities on indirect taxes - VAT.”

LeasePlan did experience strong performance in net interest income, which increased by 16 million euros.

Daemi said: “This is primarily due to an increased volume of the lease portfolio, which in turn is caused by an increased value of the average lease contract.”

The results of vehicles sold continues to show a mixed picture with some European countries experiencing material losses on the resale value of terminated leases whereas in other countries the results have been more positive.

Overall, results of vehicles sold turned into a positive contribution of 10 million euros from the previous year’s negative figure of 3 million euros.

As part of the sweeping market-wide review by Moody’s on European bank ratings, LeasePlan’s long-term debt and deposit ratings were downgraded in June by two notches to Baa2 with a stable outlook.

Daemi said: “This reflects the overall negative sentiment towards the banking industry as a whole.

“Despite this context, investors continued to express their confidence towards the company and our funding diversification strategy remained on track.”

During the first two months of the year it concluded two senior unsecured debt capital market transactions of 500 million euros and 700 million euros respectively.

In addition, retail bank deposits in LeasePlan Bank reached a total of 3.9 billion euros and in April it successfully placed £582.1 million (757 million euros) of securities backed by its UK leasing portfolio. It also repaid a large share of the bonds raised under the Dutch Government Credit Guarantee Scheme, 1.25 billion euros in February and $2.5 billion in May.

The remaining bonds (1.5 billion euros and $500 million) will be redeemed in 2014.

Daemi concluded: “Despite the unpredictable nature of the external operating environment, we remain confident in the strength of our continued business performance in the majority of countries in which we operate.”
 

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