Profit up as well as gross profit margin during the first quarter

Jamaican pre-owned car supplier, Jetcon Corporation is starting to see a recovery from COVID-19, which hit the company last year, resulting in shareholders receiving no dividend payment for 2020.

This came about as the Andrew Jackson-led company made a loss of $6.7 million for 2020 but is reporting an increase in profit for the first quarter ended March 2021, as well as a jump in gross profit margin increased. The positive financial performance for the first quarter is due in part to lower sales and marketing costs as well as a sharp decline in overall administrative expenses.

In his quarterly report to shareholders, Jackson states that, “while we see substantial recovery in our operations, our first quarter results shows that we are not back to normal levels, resulting in moderate decline in sales of vehicles with revenues for the quarter declining 11 per cent less to $202 million, from $228 million for the first quarter of 2020. The company ended the quarter with net profit of $11.5 million, a 10 per cent increase over the $10.3 million in 2020.”

Paying off loans aided the financial turnaround

One of the areas on which Jetcon focused during the past year is the reduction on inventories, which now total $324 million, down from $477 million a year ago. In addition, the pre-owned car supplier paid off loans that were on its books, which aided the turnaround performance.

Receivables ended the quarter at $94 million, up from $85 million in the same period last year. The receivables include amounts deposited with suppliers for the purchase of vehicles.

In terms of the outlook for 2021, Jackson, Jetcon’s managing director, reported that, “despite the challenges Jetcon continues to maintain a strong financial position and with vaccinations increasing and new cases decreasing, we expect business to continue recovering as the Government eases restrictions. We are pleased that orders for vehicles are up from the first quarter levels, which bodes well for the coming periods”.

The management acknowledged the contributions made by staff, customers and shareholders for their continued resilience in these challenging times.