USA Truck Reports Improved First Quarter 2014 Results

USA Truck, Inc. (NASDAQ: USAK), a leading North American transportation and logistics provider, has announced its sixth consecutive quarter of significantly improved year-over-year financial results for the three months ended March 31, 2014.

“Despite the most severe winter weather we have experienced in decades across our operating geography, we posted another quarter of strong year-over-year progress towards our operational improvement goals,” said President and CEO John Simone.

“Highlights of the quarter included an increase in consolidated base revenue of more than 12.0%, a 170-basis-point improvement in consolidated operating ratio and a 27.1% improvement in adjusted EBITDA to $10.3 million, each compared with the first quarter of 2013. In addition, we reduced debt sequentially for the third consecutive quarter, this time by $4.4 million. Since June 2013, we have reduced debt by a total of $21.5 million.

A summary of results include:

• Base revenue grows 12.1% over 1Q13 to $117.6 million
• Adjusted per share loss of $0.131 compared to loss of $0.24 in 1Q13
• Cash flow from operations improves 81.5%
• Sequential debt reduction of $4.4 million

Added Simone,”Industry pressures led to mixed results in our Trucking segment. We increased our revenue per loaded mile 3.2% and modestly improved our miles per seated tractor per week and fuel economy. We believe these improvements indicate that our turnaround efforts continue to yield positive results. In several areas, however, including maintenance, we experienced higher operating costs due to the weather, and we believe that weather conditions significantly suppressed improvement in miles per seated truck per week.

“Most of those metrics returned to normal in April, but we believe it will take several months to correct the increase in our unseated truck count, which averaged 8.0% during the quarter compared to 4.1% in the prior-year period.”

Tags: USA Truck

Category: General Update