United Rentals Q4 Profit Rises 6.3% on Broad Demand Strength
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United Rentals reported net profit of $679 million, or $10.01 per diluted share, in the fourth quarter of 2023, a 6.3% year-over-year increase compared with $639 million, or $9.15 per diluted share, in the year-ago period.
United ranks No. 10 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of the largest private carriers in North America, and No. 1 on the top equipment rental carriers list. Its fleet consisted of 3,042 tractors, 4,119 trucks and 3,559 trailers as of the start of 2023.
Stamford, Conn.-based United Rentals said total revenue in the most recent three-month period came in at $3.728 billion, a 13.1% jump compared with $3.296 billion in the year-ago period.
Rental revenue in Q4 increased 13.5% year-over-year to $3.119 billion from $2.747 billion, reflecting broad-based strength of demand across the company’s end-markets and the impact of the Ahern Rentals acquisition, United Rentals said late Jan. 24. The company’s acquisition of Ahern Rentals closed in December 2022.
Flannery
Used equipment sales in the most recent quarter increased 7.1% to $438 million from $409 million in the same period a year earlier.
URI posted a net profit of $2.424 billion, or $35.28 per diluted share, in 2023, compared with $2.105 billion, or $29.65 per diluted share, in 2022. Revenue across the full 12-month period totaled $14.332 billion, compared with $11.642 billion in 2022. URI expects revenue to total $14.65 billion to $15.15 billion in 2024.
“We entered 2023 with the goal of raising the bar and I’m incredibly pleased with the team’s performance,” CEO Matthew Flannery said in a statement accompanying the results.
“Our fourth-quarter results capped a year of new records across revenue, profits and returns driven by a relentless commitment to serving our customers, while staying laser focused on safety and operational excellence,” he added.
During a Jan. 25 analyst call, Flannery added: “We expect 2024 to be another year of growth, led by large projects. This is supported by customer sentiment indicators, solid backlogs, and most importantly feedback from our field teams.”
United Rentals expects 4% to 5% fleet growth in 2024.
The coming year is one of fleet normalization for United Rentals, with supply chains largely recovered following the COVID-19 pandemic, Flannery told analysts.
“I think we’re technically at — we’re just over 52 months right now. But when you adjust for tanks, mobile storage, some of the longer-lived assets that we’ve mixed into the fleet, we look at this from a mix perspective, we’re back to pre-COVID levels. So, we’re back to a healthy level of fleet age,” said Flannery.
“It doesn’t mean that we still don’t want to refresh and keep turning some of the assets. But net-net, we feel really good about where we are and back to pre-COVID levels when you adjust for mix of fleet,” he said.
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