2024-02-14 21:51:07
Published on: 02/14/2024 – 22:51
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The French manufacturer is reaping the benefits of a radical overhaul of its industrial organization and new ranges of cars sold at a higher price.
The Renault group’s turnover reached 52.4 billion euros, an increase of 13.1% over one year.
Dacia and Arkana
After four years of decline, the group’s sales recorded an increase of 9% with 2.235 million vehicles sold, notably by its economical brand Dacia and in the compact car segment, with the Arkana or Austral SUVs.
The turnover is driven by these volumes but also by a strong impact of price increases and the number of cars sold in higher ranges.
“It is a day of great pride, with historic results for our group,” declared the group’s financial director, Thierry Piéton, during a press conference. “They demonstrate the success of the new vehicles in our range” and “our commercial strength”.
The operating margin (ratio between operating profit and turnover) reached 7.9% at 4.1 billion euros, a record for the group.
This margin includes the deconsolidation of Horse, its joint venture in thermal engines with the Chinese Geely, Renault indicated in a press release.
After cleaning up the accounts of the company in difficulty, and taking on a costly departure from Russia, “we are now opening a new chapter in the history of Renault”, based on “performance and cash generation”, explained Mr. .Pedestrian.
The group also intends to strengthen its “flexibility” in the face of the uncertain pace of the transition to electric cars, with its thermal (Horse) and electric (Ampere) subsidiaries.
“With Ampere, Renault has taken a lead of a few years,” declared its general director Luca de Meo, in an interview with Le Figaro published Wednesday evening. “We are in a position to produce a million electric cars in Europe.”
But “the world is a little too impatient with electricity”, he stressed: “We must keep a cool head: this market will have ups and downs” and infrastructure and the world of energy have way to go. “But we will no longer go back on the switch to electric.”
The 2023 result includes 797 million euros linked to Nissan’s contribution. The sale of part of the Nissan shares held by Renault, equivalent to 5% of the capital of its Japanese partner, also brought in 764 million euros. But a capital loss on these shares impacts the accounts to the tune of 900 million euros.
The publication of Renault’s results was scheduled for Thursday 15th in the morning but was brought forward to Wednesday 14th in the evening. Its main rival in France, Stellantis (resulting from the merger of PSA and Fiat-Chrysler), had shifted the presentation of its products, announced as exceptional, to the same time slot.
“Confidence” dividend
The group will propose a dividend of 1.80 euros per share, higher than analysts’ consensus.
“It gives an indication of the level of confidence we have to increase the group’s performance,” underlined Mr. Piéton.
To continue this momentum, the group is planning 10 launches in 2024, including the electric Renault 5 and Scenic, but also the Dacia Bigster family car, the Kardian SUV in Latin America, and the small electric sports car Alpine A290.
The group therefore plans to maintain an operating margin greater than or equal to 7.5%, and free financial flows greater than 2.5 billion euros.
In markets that should be sluggish, “we remain cautious from a volume point of view, we focus on the quality of sales, and we replace vehicles at a certain level of profitability with new, much more profitable launches”, such as Renault Rafale and Dacia Duster SUVs, said Mr. Piéton.
The group intends to follow an ambitious plan aimed at halving the industrial cost of producing an electric vehicle by 2027, and reducing that of a thermal vehicle by 30%. For example, it aims to assemble a Renault 5 in less than nine hours in the French factory in Douai (North).
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