Harley- Davidson, which makes motorcycles, has been, for the once several times, trying to change itself into a company with a long- term future. Or, at least, not a company that primarily sells V- twin- powered heavy bikes to an growing population. In this regard, there was both good and bad news on Thursday, when Harley blazoned its fourth- quarter 2022 earnings results.
The good news is that Harley took in$1.14 billion in profit, which was advanced than judges were awaiting, according to The Wall Street Journal, which in turn presumably had a lot to do with Harley’s stock price going up further than 10 percent moment. Harley also said it had net income attributable to Harley of$ 42 million, a figure that the WSJ said was advanced than judges anticipated as well.( Who are Wall Street judges and why do publications like The Wall Street Journal place so important weight on their opinions? I sweat you ’ve asked one question too numerous, friend.)
“ As we conclude the alternate time of the Hardwire, Harley- Davidson delivered a strong finish to the time, with solid prosecution of our strategic pillars, ” is what Harley CEO Jochen Zeitz said in a statement.( What’s the Hardwire? It’s commodity like, uh, “ do better. ”)
The bad news is that LiveWire, Harley’s electric motorcycle division which it actually spun into a new company to go public by SPAC last time, is doing bad. Harley, for one, says it expects LiveWire to lose up to$ 125 million this time. Harley also said that LiveWire vended just 69 motorcycles in the fourth- quarter of 2022, a number that I originally allowed was a typo. It says for 2023 it hopes to have up to,000 electric units.
For environment, Harley said it vended around,200 internal combustion motorcycles in the fourth quarter in North America, with total units vended in 2022 down 12 percent from 2021, to,100, and deals were flat encyclopedically. Harley criticized part of their troubles on last time’s product arrestment, which makes sense.
Harley also said that they would be reporting LiveWire results independently from Harley results, indeed though Harley has an equity interest of89.4 percent in LiveWire. That will at least make it easier to see which corridor of the company are working or not, but a part of me wonders if Harley is really looking forward to reporting that LiveWire is dealing dozens of electric motorcycles each quarter. Just dozens, I say.