By Adria Calatayud


Kuehne + Nagel International shares fell sharply Friday after the Swiss logistics company reported fourth-quarter results that missed consensus expectations.

At 0844 GMT, shares in Kuehne + Nagel fell 11% to CHF266, erasing gains the stock logged earlier in the year and leading to a loss of 8.3% since the beginning of 2024.

The company reported an after-tax profit of 283 million Swiss francs ($320 million) in the final quarter of 2023, down from CHF494 million in the same period a year earlier.

Turnover fell 35% to CHF5.69 billion, hurt by a 54% drop in sea logistics and double-digit declines across all the company's other segments. Earnings before interest and taxes halved to CHF322 million, including redundancy costs of CHF53 million, the company said.

Analysts expected Kuehne + Nagel's fourth-quarter EBIT at CHF426 million and turnover of CHF5.86 billion, according to consensus estimates provided by the company.

The fourth-quarter earnings miss seems driven by pricing pressure in the company's sea segment, analysts at Citi wrote in a research note. As a result, consensus estimates for 2024 could be downgraded, they said.

Ahead of the results, the consensus among analysts was that Kuehne + Nagel's 2024 EBIT would be CHF1.79 billion, according to the company-compiled numbers.


Write to Adria Calatayud at adria.calatayud@wsj.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

03-01-24 0407ET