Results fall short of market forecasts
Despite the record profit, revenue and adjusted EBITDA were each 2.7% below consensus forecasts. Adjusted earnings per share of EUR 0.1918 also fell short of the EUR 0.205 forecast, a miss of 6.4%, according to Investing.com.
The early stock decline later reversed, according to related coverage on the Ariva news portal. The portal also displayed a share price of EUR 18.52, up 3.18%.
Higher profit per vehicle
Auto1 reported operating profit of just under EUR 76 million. Adjusted EBITDA reached EUR 75.6 million, a 45.7% increase from a year earlier, while its adjusted EBITDA margin rose from 2.4% to a record 3.2%. Consolidated net profit increased to EUR 37.3 million from EUR 19.2 million in Q3 2025.
Gross profit grew 15.7% to EUR 298.0 million. The group earned a record EUR 1,234 in gross profit per vehicle, compared with EUR 1,176 a year earlier.
Management attributed the improvement in gross profit per vehicle mainly to a new trading system, whose rollout across both Merchant and Retail was completed during the quarter. It said Merchant had likely realized most of the system's benefits, while Retail could still see slightly more upside.
Sales growth and supply constraints
AUTO1.com, the Merchant business serving partner dealers, sold 211,461 vehicles, up 10.3% year over year. Revenue increased 7.7% to EUR 1,784.6 million. Autohero, the Retail business selling to consumers, increased vehicle sales by 16.2% to 31,356 and revenue by 19.8% to EUR 561.0 million.
Auto1 blamed slower growth on temporary supply constraints, saying higher fuel prices had pushed buyers' and sellers' price expectations further apart. Management estimated that without those constraints, Merchant sales would have grown 21% rather than 10%, and Retail sales 33% rather than 16%.
Management characterized the affected transactions as delayed rather than lost and said it expected the gap between buyers' and sellers' price expectations to narrow over the next eight to 12 weeks.
Full-year targets unchanged
For the first nine months of 2026, Auto1 sold 731,894 vehicles, up 17%, and generated revenue of EUR 7.21 billion, up 19.5%. Gross profit increased 20%, while adjusted EBITDA rose 27% to EUR 194 million.
The company maintained its 2026 sales target of 940,000 to 1,000,000 vehicles, including 815,000 to 865,000 through Merchant and 125,000 to 135,000 through Retail. Its financial targets remain EUR 1.1 billion to EUR 1.2 billion in gross profit and EUR 250 million to EUR 275 million in adjusted EBITDA.
Management expects vehicle sales and gross profit to finish around the midpoint of their respective ranges, with adjusted EBITDA at the lower end.
