Asbury Automotive Group Inc.'s net income dropped 24 percent to $181.4 million and its revenue fell 8.4 percent to $3.58 billion during the first quarter as the national auto retailer operated with fewer stores than a year earlier.
"I am pleased with our performance coming off of a record year," Asbury CEO David Hult said in a statement Tuesday. "We were, and will continue to be, opportunistic while navigating the changing auto market and macro conditions, and we believe our strong operational model and guest-centric approach will continue to power our profitability."
Following its December 2021 purchases of Larry H. Miller Dealerships and Stevinson Automotive, Asbury sold four locations in the first quarter of 2022 and three more in the second quarter to comply with Toyota and Lexus regional store count limits. Asbury then sold nine dealerships during the fourth quarter, a transaction Hult has said represented "an opportunity" and involved a "fair price" but also was done in anticipation of a large acquisition that failed to materialize.
On a same-store basis, Asbury's revenue declined 0.8 percent in the first quarter of this year. The company did not provide same-store net income data Tuesday, but its same-store gross profit declined 5 percent.
Highlights from Asbury's first-quarter earnings report include:
Revenue: $3.58 billion, down 8.4 percent from a year earlier
Net income: $181.4 million, down 24 percent from a year earlier
Adjusted net income: $181.4 million down 15 percent from a year earlier
Vehicle sales: 34,506 new vehicles, down 12 percent from a year earlier; 32,989 used vehicles, down 14 percent
Asbury, of Duluth, Ga., ranks No. 5 on Automotive News' list of the top 150 dealership groups based in the U.S., with retail sales of 151,179 new vehicles in 2022.
