Report
Press release
Sales:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â $2,045 million
Operating margin: Â Â Â Â 11.0%
Operating cash flow:Â $293 million
EPS:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â $1.70
(Stockholm, Feb. 1, 2012) - - - For the three-month period ended December 31, 2011, Autoliv, Inc. (NYSE: ALV and SSE: ALIV) - the worldwide leader in automotive safety systems - met its guidance and reported the eighth consecutive quarter with double digit operating margins.
Consolidated net sales increased by 7% to $2,045 million compared to the same quarter in 2010. Organic sales grew at a rate of 7% compared to the increase in global light vehicle production (LVP) which is estimated by IHS to have been 1%. This is the ninth consecutive quarter that Autoliv has outperformed the global LVP.
Operating income amounted to $224 million, income before taxes to $211 mil-lion, net income to $160 million and earnings per share assuming dilution to $1.70.
Operating margin amounted to 11.0% including a 0.3 percentage point negative effect from expenses related to the on-going antitrust investigations. At the beginning of the quarter, the Company expected an operating margin in the range of 11.0-11.5%, excluding expenses related to the investigations.
Cash flow from operations amounted to $293 million and $178 million before financing.
The Company expects consolidated sales to increase by 2% for the first quarter and by nearly 4% for the full year 2012 with the organic sales portion growing by nearly 5% and around 7%, respectively. An operating margin of around 10% is expected for the first quarter and in the range of 10-11% for the full year, excluding any impact from the antitrust investigations and costs for capacity alignments. The alignment costs are difficult to assess at this point, but they could be more than $50 million.
An earnings conference call will be held at 3:00 p.m. (CET) today February 1. To follow the webcast or to obtain phone numbers, please access www.autoliv.com.