Radiant Logistics Profits Slump as Transportation Costs Rise

Radiant Logistics, a provider of domestic and international freight forwarding, truck and rail brokerage, warehousing and order fulfillment services, reported lower profits in the fiscal third quarter despite a buoyant freight market that pushed up gross revenues 12.2% in the three months ended March 31.

CEO Bohn Crain said the Bellevue, Wash.-based company had to pay more to freight carriers due to tight capacity, putting a squeeze on profits.

“Top-line revenues were $203.9 million for the quarter, up $22.1 million or 12.2% over the comparable prior-year period,” Crain noted in a May 9 statement. “We saw revenue growth across all categories with forwarding revenues up $17.5 million and 13.4%, brokerage revenues up $2.7 million and 5.5% and value-added services revenues up $2 million and 122.7%.”

Net revenues, which are calculated by subtracting the cost of purchased transportation from top-line revenues, were $49.1 million in the most recent quarter, up only 7.5% compared with $45.7 million in the same period a year ago.

Operating expenses increased to $47.7 million in the latest quarter, up from $43.7 million a year ago, which cut into the bottom line.

Crain

Net income attributable to common stockholders was $167,000, or less than 1 cent per share, in the fiscal third quarter, down from $396,000, or 1 cent per share, in the same period a year ago.

For the first nine months of the fiscal year, Radiant reported net income of $3.8 million, or 8 cents a share, on gross revenues of $608.6 million. That compared with net income of $3.8 million, or 8 cents a share, on revenues of $575.8 million in the comparable period a year earlier. Net revenues were $143.2 million in the nine months ended March 31 versus $144.8 million in the same period a year ago.

Crain said he expects profits to improve over the next several quarters as the company passes on increases in costs to customers while continuing to grow overall shipment volumes.

“In addition,” he said, “we continue to see strong demand for our Canada-based materials management and distribution solutions offering and believe our strategic decision to bundle value-added logistics solutions with our core transportation service offering will continue to deliver positive results.”

The company also announced that its intermodal subsidiary, Clipper Express, has entered into a lease financing agreement with Banc of America Leasing & Capital for up to 100 refrigerated trailers through Dec. 31.

The lease program will free up cash to pursue acquisition opportunities, buy back stock and perhaps retire some preferred stock holdings later in the year, Crain noted.

The company’s most recent acquisition was Canadian firm Lomas Logistics in April 2017.

Radiant Logistics ranks No. 41 on the 2018 Transport Topics list of largest freight brokerage firms and No. 112 on the list of largest warehousing firms in North America.