Results were also significantly boosted by Caterpillar’s success with Bucyrus International. Terex sold Bucyrus to Cat last year but held onto 5.8m shares. Under Cat ownership, the share price rose, enabling Terex to sell 1.8m of them for a higher than expected $33.2m.
Net sales from continuing operations were $1,256.2m in the first quarter of 2011, an increase of 34.2% from $935.9m in the first quarter of 2010. Loss from operations was $9.3m in the first quarter of 2011, an improvement of $57.2m on the loss from operations of $66.5m in the first quarter of 2010.
Forecast for full year sales has been revised upwards from $5bn-$5.4bn range to $5.2bn-$5.5bn.
Backlog for orders deliverable during the next 12 months was $1,8bn at 31 March 2011, up 46% from the year before and up 38% from the previous quarter.
Chairman and chief executive Ron DeFeo said: “Overall, the first quarter results were largely in line with our expectations. Order activity continues to accelerate, and demand has picked up sharply, leading to increased quarterly sales in most of our businesses. This is most evident by the significantly increased backlog seen in all four of our segments at the end of the first quarter.
“Somewhat offsetting favorable demand trends are increased input costs, mostly associated with purchased materials such as steel, hydraulics, tyres and other manufacturing components. In response, we have recently increased pricing in an effort to regain the profitability we would expect from each product line. We also see some potential risks associated with component availability and are monitoring our supplier base closely.”
Mr DeFeo continued: “The economic recovery is taking hold in many major markets for Terex. As we had previously indicated, we expected our cranes segment to be challenged in the first half of 2011 as we work through the effects of inconsistent demand for many of our larger cranes during 2010. This was particularly evident in our port equipment line of business, where we had several customers delay delivery in the first quarter, which led to a larger than expected loss for the segment overall.
We expect to deliver these cranes during the upcoming months and for our orders and deliveries to improve as we move through the year. Longer term, we are optimistic about our cranes segment, as we have seen a significant increase in demand from North America, as well as a continued increase in activity in developing markets.”
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