Encouraging19 Mar 2021 07:42
At 0910 GMT, the shares were up 9.4% at 53.90p.
Peel Hunt said it had been expecting a full-year loss of £3.8m. "The outperformance reflects a significant improvement in working capital, leading to lower stock provisions, and a strong end to the year, achieving OEM targets," it said.
"Net debt levels have also improved significantly from £45m in December. Given the one-off nature of the outperformance, we leave our ongoing forecasts unchanged, although industry commentary suggests the market is performing well in the key month of March."
The broker said the key question is how long it will take to get profits back up to the £65m+ level.
Liberum, which had been expecting a £3.2n loss, said net debt of £45m was as expected.
"While encouraging to see a better FY20E result, the key will be what the recovery trajectory looks like from here. Q1 will be tough, given the lockdown impact on the largest new car trading month of March, but we expect demand to be strong once dealerships reopen in April."