Penske Automotive Group - Earnings Call - Q2 2025

Executive Summary

• Q2 2025 delivered resilient profitability: EPS rose 5% to $3.78 and EBT margin held at 4.4%, driven by 50 bps gross margin expansion and SG&A-to-gross-profit improvement to 69.9%.
• Versus S&P Global consensus, EPS beat by ~$0.22 (≈+6%), while revenue missed by ~0.8% on divestiture/closures and brand-specific wholesale pauses; management quantified ~$200M prior-year revenue not present in Q2 2025 and brand shipment delays amid tariff uncertainty.
• Mix and execution tailwinds: same‑store service & parts gross profit +9% and margin +50 bps; used PVR strength in both autos and trucks; used truck GPU +56% at PTG.
• Capital returns remain supportive: dividend increased 4.8% to $1.32 (19th consecutive raise) and $296M buyback capacity remained at quarter-end; liquidity ~$2.3B; leverage 1.2x.
• Near-term catalysts/risks: July U.S. new units up ~10% MTD; BEV tax credit sunset could pull forward Q3 demand; tariff/regulatory outcomes and PTS gain-on-sale variability remain watch items.

What Went Well and What Went Wrong

• What Went Well

  • Service & parts outperformance: same-store S&P revenue +7% and gross profit +9%; S&P margin +50 bps YoY to 59.2%. “Our U.S. service and parts operations generated record levels of revenue and gross profit”.
  • Cost discipline: SG&A-to-gross-profit improved 30 bps to 69.9% as advertising/compensation control held, supporting the third straight quarter of YoY earnings growth.
  • Variable gross resilience: combined new/used/F&I variable GPU increased $583 YoY to $5,691; used auto GPU +28% YoY to $2,326; PTG used truck GPU +56% to $7,037, aided by tight late-model supply.

• What Went Wrong

  • Top-line softness: revenue -0.4% YoY to $7.66B from divestitures/closures (~$200M PY headwind) and brand wholesale pauses during tariff talks; retail auto units -12% total.
  • F&I pressure: retail auto F&I revenue and gross -3.9% YoY; same-store F&I -1.5% amid mix and BEV discounting dynamics.
  • PTG new truck margin compression: PTG new truck margin -80 bps YoY (5.6%); service & parts margin -100 bps; same-store truck gross -5% with lower new GPU and weaker F&I.

Transcript

Operator (participant)

Good afternoon. Welcome to the Penske Automotive Group Second Quarter 2025 Earnings Conference Call. Today's call is being recorded and will be available for replay approximately one hour after completion through August 6, 2025 on the Company's website under the Investors tab at www.penskeautomotive.com. I will now introduce Tony Pordon, the Company's Executive Vice President of Investor Relations and Corporate Development. Sir, please go ahead.

Tony Pordon (Executive VP of Investor Relations and Corporate Development)

Thank you. Julieann, good afternoon everyone and thank you for joining us today. A press release detailing Penske Automotive Group's Second Quarter 2025 financial results was issued this morning and is posted on our website along with a presentation designed to assist you in understanding the company's results. As always, I'm available by email or phone for any follow up questions you may have. Joining me for today's call are Roger Penske, Chair and CEO, Shelley Hulgrave, EVP and Chief Financial Officer, Rich Shearing, North American Operations, Randall Seymour, International Operations, and Tony Piccione, our Vice President Corporate Controller. Our discussion today may include forward looking statements about our operations, earnings potential, outlook, acquisitions, future events, growth plans, liquidity and assessment of business conditions.

We may also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures as defined under SEC rules such as earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization or EBITDA, adjusted net income, adjusted earnings per share, adjusted selling, general and administration expenses, and our leverage ratio. We have prominently presented the comparable GAAP measures and have reconciled the non-GAAP measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures in this morning's press release and investor presentation, both of which are available again on our website. Our future results may vary from our expectations because of risks and uncertainties outlined in today's press release under Forward Looking Statements. I also direct you to our SEC filings, including our Form 10-K and previously filed Form 10-Qs for additional discussion and factors that could cause future results to differ materially from expectations. I will now turn the call over to Roger Penske.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Thank you, Tony. Good afternoon, everyone. I'm really pleased with the performance of our diversified international transportation service business. In the Second Quarter, our revenue was AUD 7.7 billion, which was consistent with Q2 last year. Our Q2 revenue was impacted by strategic divestitures and dealership closures made since quarter two in 2024, representing approximately AUD 200 million in revenue. EBT increased 4%, our net income increased 4%, and earnings per share increased 5% when compared to the Second Quarter of 2024. Q2 represented our third consecutive quarter of Year-over-Year earnings growth, and we generated AUD 337 million of income before taxes, AUD 250 million in net income, and AUD 3.78 per share. Our EBT margin increased 20 basis points to 4.4% when compared to Q2 last year.

The Second Quarter performance was highlighted by a 9% increase in same-store retail automotive service and parts gross profit and a 50 basis point increase in service and parts gross margin. Also, an increase in fixed cost absorption of 330 basis points in the U.S. and 30 basis points in the U.K. Our gross profit increased to AUD 1.3 billion, which compares to AUD 868 million in Q2 in 2019. The company gross profit margin increased 50 basis points to 16.9%, representing the eighth consecutive quarter of strong and stable gross margin. New and used vehicle grosses increased AUD 141 in the quarter for new and AUD 384 sequentially. Used grosses increased AUD 504 per unit for the quarter and AUD 177 sequentially. New and used vehicle gross and F&I combined, or what we call variable gross profit, increased AUD 583 per unit or 11% to AUD 5,691.

Our focus on controlling costs such as advertising and compensation as a percentage of gross profit helped drive selling, general, and administrative expenses as a percentage of gross profit, or SG&A, to 69.9%, a 30 basis point improvement. As we look at the current environment, we are encouraged by the recent trade agreements. In fact, the recent agreement with the EU is expected to provide benefits to two of our largest partners that should benefit from the agreement by exporting U.S. production. We've seen some OEMs increase prices modestly while others have extended during the current pricing. The situation remains fluid. We remain in close contact with our OEM partners. I think our diversification is a key differentiator as approximately 61% of our revenue is generated in North America, 29% in the U.K., and 10% from other international markets. PAG's premium brand mix are present in the U.S.

and international automotive markets. Our North American retail commercial truck dealerships and earnings from Penske Transportation Solutions, coupled with our highly variable cost structure, provide us with opportunities to flex our business to meet the changing automotive and commercial truck landscape. Let me now turn it over to Rich Shearing, who handles our North American operations.

Rich,

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

Thank you, Roger, and good afternoon, everyone. In our automotive retail business during the Second Quarter, we experienced elevated traffic during April and May. We believe the pent-up demand is driving customer resilience, and we have seen stronger traffic and closing ratios so far in July, with sales up approximately 10% month to date versus prior year. In the Second Quarter, our new units in the U.S. were up 1%. Some OEMs held off from shipping product as tariff negotiations took place, limiting inventory of some brands. During the quarter, 34% of new units sold were at MSRP compared to 35% in the Second Quarter last year. Second Quarter used vehicle sales declined 3% and were constrained by fewer lease returns and rising prices. We expect the lower level of lease maturities to bottom this year and begin improving in 2026.

We expect franchise dealers will benefit from increasing lease returns for used vehicle sourcing. In that time period, our U.S. service and parts operations generated record levels of revenue and gross profit. Same store service and parts revenue increased 7% and related gross profit increased 9%. Same store gross margin increased 90 basis points. Customer pay gross was up 6% and warranty was up 24%. We have approximately 6,000 service bays and 5,800 technicians, and our technician count is up 2% from June of last year. While our service and parts revenue and gross profit is at a record level, we continue to focus on driving higher utilization of our bays and increasing fixed cost absorption. Turning to Premier Truck Group, we operate 45 locations and remain one of the largest commercial truck retailers for Daimler Trucks North America.

Daimler Trucks North America continues to have the largest share in the Class 8 market at 42.5% year to date. Premier Truck Group is one of the core pillars of our diversified model and represents 12% of revenue and 11% of gross profit. As we look ahead, the U.S. Congress revoked the EPA waiver that allowed California to adopt more stringent emissions rules, which means manufacturers and dealers will no longer have to navigate different rules across different states. Coupled with the waivers being rescinded for Advanced Clean Truck and Advanced Clean Fleet rules, the ZEV mandates have also been effectively removed. As a result, we believe the potential cost increases for the 2027 model year Class 8 trucks will be more muted than originally expected. During Q2, Premier Truck Group sold 5,339 new and used units. New was up 4% and used units was down 8%.

Although used units declined, used truck grosses increased over 50% to AUD 7,037 from AUD 4,502 as late model low mileage trucks continue to be in short supply. At the end of June, the current industry backlog was 90,400 units or approximately four to five months worth of sales. We did note some pull ahead ordering during the quarter as a result of tariffs as some customers looked to lock in lower prices. Same-store service and parts revenue increased 1% as well. Looking out over the next six months, for the first time in approximately five years, Daimler Trucks are no longer being allocated on a distribution level to their dealers. This provides us with an opportunity to conquest new customers. Now turning to Penske Transportation Solutions. Penske Automotive Group owns 28.9% of PTS and records equity income, receives cash distributions and cash tax savings.

PAG invested AUD 956 million for its ownership and has received nearly AUD 2 billion in cash flow benefits since making that first investment. During Q2, operating revenue was AUD 2.8 billion. Full service revenue and contract increased 4%. Logistics revenue was flat while rental revenue declined 9%. During the quarter, PTS sold over 11,000 units and ended the quarter with 414,000 units, down from 428,000 units at the end of March. PTS income increased during Q2 as a result of efforts to optimize costs, improve utilization rates and hold pricing. Equity earnings from PTS investment were AUD 53.5 million, up from AUD 52.9 million in the Second Quarter last year. I would now like to turn the call over to Randall Seymour to discuss our international operations.

Randall Seymore (COO of International Operations)

Randall,

Thanks Rich, and good afternoon everyone. PAG's international operations represent approximately 40% of total consolidated revenue during Q2. International revenue was AUD 2.9 billion in the U.K. The macro operating environment remains challenging as inflation, interest rates, higher taxes, and consumer affordability impact the overall market. The U.K. market continues to transition new vehicle sales to BEVs and hybrids in 2025. The government target for BEV penetration is 28%, many of which are being sold through the corporate fleet channels. During Q2, the number of new units we delivered declined by 16% and were impacted by several factors resulting from OEM product changes and reduced incentive offerings. Also impacting the new car markets are the U.K. ZEV mandates and the previously discussed disposed or closed dealerships turning to used cars. Same-store used units declined 23%, which is attributable to the realignment of the company's U.K.

Car-Shop used-only dealerships to Sytner Select in 2024. Through this realignment, we have taken out approximately 500 people through attrition, which helped drive a lower cost structure. The realignment began in Q3 2024, so the Year-over-Year decline is expected to abate in the second half of this year. We view this as a positive change for our business, and as a result of this strategy and improved management of overall used inventory, gross profit per unit has increased by over AUD 800 or 56% quarter-over-quarter, and AUD 221 sequentially when compared to the first quarter of 2025. Service and parts remained strong as same-store revenue increased 6% and gross profit increased 8%. Pleasingly, customer pay gross profit increased 10% and warranty declined 5%, largely due to the 20% growth we achieved in Q2 of last year.

Turning to Australia, we operate three Porsche dealerships in Melbourne, which we acquired in 2024. During the first half of this year, these dealerships retailed 1,136 new and used units and generated AUD 128 million in revenue. The used to new ratio is nearly 1:1 and has doubled when compared to the ratio prior to the acquisition. We use our existing scale of the commercial vehicle and power systems business in Australia to leverage cost while executing our one ecosystem strategy at the Porsche dealerships, which provides for a superior customer experience. We anticipate generating approximately AUD 450 million in annualized revenue through these automotive dealerships. Turning to the Australia commercial vehicle and power system business, we are diversified with revenue and gross profit which is split approximately 50-50 between our on and off highway markets.

In the on highway markets, the brands we represent have picked up 30 basis points in market share as the products we continue to sell gain customer preference. In the off highway sector, revenue and margin were driven by strong energy solutions demand. We have a AUD 350 million backlog for 2025 delivery and a total order bank of over AUD 500 million, predominantly related to the large growth in data center and battery energy storage solution businesses. We see a potential for the total energy solutions business to generate over AUD 1 billion in revenue by 2030. Our defense business continues its strong momentum too with projects for infantry fighting vehicles and several Navy applications for frigates and submarines. I'd now like to return the call over to Shelley Hulgrave to review our cash flow, balance sheet and capital allocation.

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

Thank you, Randall. Good afternoon, everyone. Our strategy has been to focus on the strength of our balance sheet, cash flow, disciplined approach to capital allocation, and our diversification. Our balance sheet remains in great shape, and our continued strong cash flow provides us with opportunities to maximize effective and opportunistic capital allocation. For the six months ended June 30, 2025, we generated AUD 472 million in cash flow from operations, and EBITDA was AUD 800 million. On a trailing twelve month basis, EBITDA was over AUD 1.5 billion. Our free cash flow, which is cash flow from operations after deducting capital expenditures, was AUD 325 million. Through June 30, we paid AUD 165 million in dividends and invested AUD 147 million in capital expenditures. We increased our dividend by 4.8% to AUD 1.32 per share last week, representing the 19th consecutive quarterly increase.

Since the end of 2023, we have increased the dividend by 67% on a forward basis. Our current dividend yield is approximately 3.1% with a payout ratio of 34.7% over the last 12 months. During the quarter, we repurchased 630,000 shares of stock for AUD 93 million, and year to date through June 30, we have repurchased 885,000 shares for AUD 133 million, representing approximately 1.3% of our outstanding shares. Over the last four plus years, we have returned over AUD 2.5 billion to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases. In May, our Board authorized an increase in the repurchase authority of AUD 250 million. As of June 30, we have AUD 295.7 million remaining under the existing securities repurchase authorization as part of our strategic capital allocation. In July, we acquired a Ferrari dealership in Modena, Italy. As many of you know, Modena is the home of the Ferrari brand.

While we continue to evaluate the impact of the one big beautiful bill on our financial statements, we do expect to recognize positive cash flow impacts related to our 28.9% ownership in the PTS partnership. Bonus depreciation in particular will provide an estimated benefit of approximately AUD 150 million on the AUD 3 billion worth of capital expenditures and trucks that PTS expects to purchase in each of the next three years and beyond. At the end of June, our non-vehicle long term debt was AUD 1.78 billion, down AUD 69 million from the end of December last year. Debt to total capitalization improved to 24% from 26.1% at the end of December last year, and leverage remained at 1.2 times. 77% of the non-vehicle long term debt is at fixed rates. When including floor plan we have AUD 4.6 billion of variable debt. 54% of our variable rate debt is in the U.S.

We estimate a 25 basis point change in interest rates would impact interest expense by approximately AUD 12 million. At the end of June we had AUD 155 million of cash and liquidity of AUD 2.3 billion. In September, our AUD 550 million of 3.5% senior subordinated notes will mature. We currently expect to repay those notes from cash flow from operations or borrowings under our U.S. credit agreement. Total inventory was AUD 4.8 billion, up AUD 209 million from the end of December 2024. Retail automotive inventory was up AUD 44 million. New vehicles declined AUD 20 million. Used vehicles increased AUD 49 million and parts increased AUD 15 million. Commercial vehicle inventory was up AUD 166 million. Floor plan debt was AUD 4.2 billion. New and used inventory remains in good shape. New vehicle inventory is at a 57 day supply including 59 days for premium and 38 days for volume.

Foreign used vehicle inventory is at a 44 day supply. At this time I will turn the call back to Roger for some final remarks.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Thank you, Shelley. As I mentioned earlier, I continue to be pleased with our performance and the resilience of our business and would like to thank each of our 28,000 team members that work in our business each day for their efforts to exceed expectations. Our results continue to demonstrate the benefit from our diversification across the retail, automotive, commercial truck industries, our cost control and a disciplined capital allocation strategy and certainly a strong balance sheet and cash flow. I remain confident in our diversified model and its ability to flex with market conditions and remain very pleased with the performance of our business. I want to thank all of you for joining the call today and we'll open it up for questions with the operator. Thank you.

Operator (participant)

Thank you. If you would like to ask a question, please press STAR followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. To withdraw any questions, press STAR one. Again, our first question comes from Michael Ward from Citi Research. Please go ahead, your line is open.

Michael Ward (Managing Director)

Thank you very much. Good afternoon everyone.

I wonder if you can quantify a.

Few of the moving pieces that affected.

Your unit sales in the U.S. and the U.K.?

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

Sure. Mike, it's Shelley. I'm happy to take that. As we mentioned, we had approximately AUD 200 million of revenue in the quarter in 2024 that we did not have in 2025. We sold and divested of a few stores. We also closed some stores, some of which related to the Sytner Select business in the U.K. as mentioned. When you look at new and used vehicle units that had an impact as well. New units related to those divested stores were approximately 2,000 units and we also had the Mini brand transfer over to agency so that impacted the new units by approximately 1,300. When you take that against the units that we reported, we actually were only down about 17 new units quarter-over-quarter. From a used perspective, those divested or closed stores attributed to about 4,400 used units.

Michael Ward (Managing Director)

Okay, and what about. That's the U.K., right? They divested in the Mini.

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

It's all. It's all of it. We had some stores that we divested in the U.S. as well.

Michael Ward (Managing Director)

Okay, okay,

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

It's just the U.K.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

We also had.

Mobility in the U.K. is a product that people that qualify for mobility credits. That was really slowed way down by Audi, BMW and Mercedes during the quarter. Really were not in that business, which obviously was an impact to us from the premium premium sector. We see that coming back this, this quarter. I think this was all part of a strategy. They were waiting to see what the tariff structure was going to be and did not want to pour a lot of their incentive money into mobility. Now that has changed. Now we will have to see how that rolls out here based on the current information we have regarding the 15% tariff for European Union.

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

Mike, I think on a smaller scale, to add to Roger's point, in the U.S. we had Audi, Porsche and Land Rover kind of suspend wholesales for a period of 45 days in the Second Quarter as they were further looking to understand what the tariff outcome was going to be. That probably impacted our Porsche business the most. If you look at that brand, our EBT was down 9% in the Second Quarter, whereas year to date we're up 1%. That certainly hurt our mix. That wholesale from those brands now is flowing again. It was a short term impact.

Michael Ward (Managing Director)

Okay, and is that partly attributed? You said July was up 10%. Is some of that coming back? Is that what that is?

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

I think it's resiliency of the consumer we're seeing. Traffic counts kind of remain flat year over year, but conversion has ticked up. There are more serious buyers. I would say in June our conversion of the traffic was down a little bit because I think there was still uncertainty in what the ultimate tariffs were going to look like. Now that we've got, you know, conclusive positions with Japan, which obviously impacts our Toyota, Honda business, the U.K. with Land Rover, Mini, and then the EU with Audi, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Porsche, the majority of the brand mix we have in the U.S. has some certainty on what the tariffs are going to look like going forward.

Michael Ward (Managing Director)

Thank you.

Shelley, the AUD 150 million from the big beautiful bill, that's in addition to any dividend income you get from your equity stake, correct?

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

That's right, Mike. We still have the 50% dividend policy that we receive each year and then the one big beautiful bill. Bonus depreciation in particular was an item in the Tax Cut Jobs Act that was starting to sunset. We were starting to have to pay more in income taxes from a cash perspective in 2024 and projected for 2025, when that bonus depreciation was supposed to go away. The one big beautiful bill made it permanent and retroactive back to purchases to mid January. It's an estimate of the deferred cash taxes that we expect to enjoy this year and into the future.

Michael Ward (Managing Director)

That will benefit this year?

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Oh, yeah, yeah,

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

Yeah.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

We look at about AUD 3 billion-AUD 3.5 billion of asset purchases at PTS each year going forward. Obviously, with roughly 30% of the ownership, it's a partnership. We get the benefit on our tax line.

So you.

Overall, it was a terrific benefit to us. You know, if you look at this year and say it is the same in 2026 and 2027, it could be as much as AUD 450 million that we would not have to pay due to this in corporate taxes.

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

I want to highlight, it does not impact our rate. It is really just the cash taxes that we have to pay. Given that it is a cash benefit, we certainly will look to deploy that cash through our capital allocation strategies. We certainly see that as a benefit going forward.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

On PTS, we have a program there that typically 50% of our earnings before taxes is paid out to the dividend, to the shareholders based on their ownership piece. Based on our current projection, this could be roughly another AUD 100 million. You'd look at almost AUD 250 million of benefit during 2025 in cash.

Michael Ward (Managing Director)

Fantastic. Thank you very much.

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

Thanks, Mike.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Ron Jewsikow from Guggenheim Securities. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Hey, Ron.

Ron Jewsikow (Research Analyst)

Hey, Roger. Yeah, good afternoon and thanks for taking my questions. Yeah, just before my questions, I wanted to say congratulations, Roger, on the Centennial Award recognition last month.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Thank you. That was a byproduct of the 74,000 people that work for us every day. I appreciate you mentioning it. Thank you.

Ron Jewsikow (Research Analyst)

I appreciate the quarter to date commentary on volumes. Maybe if we could just touch on the GPU trajectory and the cadence throughout the quarter and then into July, if you can talk about that as well.

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

Yeah, Ron Rich here. I think when you look at the initial tariff announcement in, in March, I think it was, you know, that certainly drove some activity. We saw activity spike probably into April and to a lesser extent in May and June. Obviously we knew that our inventory that was non-tariff impacted at that point in time became more valuable. There was no need to be giving those cars away, not knowing what the ultimate tariff impact was going to be and when final resolution was going to be made between these countries. You know, throughout the quarter in the U.S. our grosses were very stable. Certainly they were the highest in April at AUD 7,250. Then you look over the quarter between May and June, the spread between those other months was no more than AUD 125.

I think our team did a really good job of balancing the volume with the grosses during that environment. I think as we go forward, as we look to May, and I said, the sales activity is increased, I think we'll see a little bit of a gross compression and it's going to be different by brand. Certainly I think the other impact when you look at BEVs, with the IRA tax credit going away at the end of September, our team is keenly focused on making deals with consumers that are interested in the BEV so that we have the least amount of inventory in that timeframe as possible. I think the OEMs are similarly motivated as well. We've seen, with the announcement of those, that tax credit going away, increased incentives on various different models as OEMs look to reduce that inventory.

I think when you look at the margin that we have on the new vehicles, our margins have remained the same, but the average vehicle selling price continues to increase. I think we talked about this before, pre-COVID or 2019 and earlier, average selling price was AUD 41,000. Our average selling price today is almost AUD 61,000.

Ron Jewsikow (Research Analyst)

That's super helpful color. You kind of touched on my next question a bit there. On the sunsetting of electric vehicle tax credits at the end of the Third Quarter in the U.S., you do have more BEV sales than your peers, just given your luxury mix. How should we think about the impacts not just in the Third Quarter from volume pull forward, but also long term? I guess. What would the impact of weaker electric vehicle sales mean for your business? Because they are GPU dilutive. We do know that. Just kind of the puts and.

Takes,

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

I think, you know, first of all, you got to remember that the overall BEV sales as a percent of it, percentage of our total sales, is in that 6.5%-7% range. So it's a small portion of our overall sales. Certainly in some markets, it's a much higher percentage when you look at California or some of the Sun Belt states where you don't have the degradation of the range and other operating concerns associated with a BEV. But we've already seen actually some improvement in those markets as the OEMs have adjusted to demand. If you look at our West region, which is California, Texas, Arizona, that market, those markets sell about 70% of that 6.5%-7% of our sales in BEV. And, you know, Mercedes and others started to adjust last year to match the BEV wholesale supply to the demand. I think most aggressively it was Mercedes.

When you look at our area there, our California businesses, you know, are up 45% or almost AUD 13 million compared to a year ago as a result of some of that BEV, you know, being adjusted. You look at the incentives. It's, you know, even before the tax credits were announced, incentives are almost AUD 7,200 for BEVs. It's about twice the average incentive that we see on the ICE vehicles. And our inventory is down on BEVs. A year ago, we were about 12%-15% of our new car inventory was BEVs. It's at 10% today, down 20% on a unit basis Year-over-Year. You know, I think BEVs, we're going to continue to have BEVs. Obviously, the OEMs have made significant capital investments in the technology and vehicle platform architectures.

It's a matter of making sure that they balance the BEV wholesale supply to us with the actual market demand. We've been doing that now with the tax credit, and we'll continue to do it, you know, after the tax credit. I think one last point. On BEVs, you know, still relatively small percentage overall of our fixed business, 2%-3%. But we see on a dollars per RO, almost two times the benefit from a BEV repair as we do to a, you know, an ICE repair. I think as the vehicles, you know, get more mature over time, that could normalize. But right now, you know, BEVs are still more advantageous in the fixed area.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Yeah. I think also when we step back and look at supply, when the manufacturers were trying to balance BEV vehicles versus ICE, we actually lost some of the volume and supply during the time when BEVs were at the top of the list to try to generate this big market share. When that goes away, I think we're going to see it obviously in some of the key SUVs and areas that we were looking for vehicles will now not be BEVs and they'll come back in the market as ICE vehicles. I think they'll adjust if necessary, some of the content if we have to in order to have the vehicles affordable under any tariff impact they might have. I see it being a benefit. This is my own personal opinion.

Ron Jewsikow (Research Analyst)

Yeah, I think we lean that direction as well. It's good to hear that from you, Roger. I'll hop back in the queue and ask questions if needed. Thank you.

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

Thanks.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Jeff Lick from Stephens.

Please go ahead.

Your line is open.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Hey Jeff.

Jeff Lick (Managing Director)

Good afternoon, Roger.

Rich, Randall, Shelley, Tony, thanks for taking the question. Just a quick clarification before I get to my main question. On the 10% units you mentioned, you know, being up in July, is that all units or just new?

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

That's new.

Jeff Lick (Managing Director)

Okay.

New U.S.

Perfect.

Awesome.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Rich, I was wondering if we can maybe double click on service and parts.

You know, we're starting to get into.

The, you know, laughing, the BMW stop sales, and you know, other, you know.

Pretty big warranty items.

Just curious how you see that playing out. You know, are the OEMs making any adjustments in terms of how they handle warranty claims? Just any color there would be great.

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

No, I don't think we're seeing any adjustment from the OEMs on how they're handling warranty claims. I think they're, you know, frustrated obviously with the number of recalls that continue to occur. You mentioned BMW. Certainly the IBS recall is still active. You know, their focus last year was on, you know, vehicles at the plant, getting those cleaned, then dealer inventory. Now we're into the customer repairs. We've got Mercedes-Benz fuel pump, Honda fuel pumps, and then the big one that, you know, we just had release and direction on is Toyota and the Tundra long block replacement, which is a 14 hour repair. We've got close to 400 of those in inventory that have been on stop sale.

Certainly we've got to balance those repairs with, you know, customers who are looking to bring their existing cars into the shop so that we don't end up with long backlogs and things of that nature. I think there's enough customer demand that even if these recalls and the warranty as a % of our total repair orders goes down, when you look at the car park being 12-13 years of age, average mileage being close to 70,000 miles, we're going to continue to see the benefit in the fixed ops department. I think with some of the initiatives that we've undertaken relative to shop load, operating hours, shift schedules, those are all paying, you know, paying benefits as well.

I think, you know, Roger mentioned that in our fixed absorption increase, our margin improvement up 50 basis points, adjusting near 60%, and then our effective labor rate as well, you know, at up 6%. I think it's going to take a while for that car park to adjust. You look at the vehicles we're selling today or servicing today, there's almost six and a quarter years of age on average and that's up from 5.6 in 2019. With the SAAR continuing to struggle to find a new high water mark, I think I see fixed operations remaining strong.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

I would say also that the complexity, Jeff, of the premium luxury cars, when you open the hood and all the things that they have, lidar and all these things that go with it, the vehicles are coming back to the dealership and they're not going anymore to the local guy around the corner. That's driving the business. I think that in most cases, as you know, for us on the premium luxury side, which is 71%, a lot of these vehicles are leased and have some maintenance component with them and that drives them back to our shops, which I think is key. The good news is that the cost structure in our service department from a labor perspective is flat rate along with high bonus part of compensation for our service writers.

You know, we see the ability, obviously we raise labor rates and by the way, we typically get a bump in labor cost support from the manufacturers on warranty, typically on a 12-18 month basis. Obviously we get that benefit. On the parts side we get paid our full list price on parts on warranty. This is something that is very positive. Ironically in Europe and in the U.K. we only get 10%. I look at this as a real bonus here in the U.S. based on the current support of parts and service.

Jeff Lick (Managing Director)

Thanks for taking my question and I'll.

Get back to .

Go ahead.

Tony Pordon (Executive VP of Investor Relations and Corporate Development)

Jeff, the other thing to think about with this is, Tony, is the efficiency that we're creating in the service departments too, through use of AI in terms of scheduling, appointments, tech videos, online pays, and numerous other things that we're doing to try to drive not just more tech efficiency, but just overall efficiency and utilization. I think all of that plays very well into the margin that we're generating and the growth of the parts and service business.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

When you look at, let's just jump to PTS for a minute. And we've taken some of the lessons learned on both sides. Every night, Jeff, we unload data from 200,000 vehicles from the cloud and we look at that and it determines predictive maintenance. We might have a truck that's hauling cement and the same truck hauling feathers. Obviously the maintenance requirements certainly would be different. With this data, then we can adjust the predictive maintenance. On top of that, when the truck comes in, the mechanic plugs in to the ECU and it gives him guided repair, tells him exactly what to do on that truck and how to do it. This has taken our efficiency way up. I would say we've been using AI a long time, specifically at PTS, and we're looking how we can get some of that crossover into the automotive side.

Jeff Lick (Managing Director)

Awesome, thanks.

I. I can't imagine a Penske.

Truck with a bunch of feathers in it. Roger, that doesn't seem right to me.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

As long as happy,

Jeff Lick (Managing Director)

that's true. As long as it's paying full price, absolutely. Thanks very much.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Let someone else ask a question.

Rich Shearing (COO of North America)

Thanks, Jeff.

Operator (participant)

Our next question comes from Rajat Gupta from JPMorgan. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Hi, Rajat.

Rajat Gupta (Research Analyst)

Great.

Hey, Roger.

Congrats as well. Thanks everyone for taking the questions. Just wanted to follow up on PTL. It looks like if we exclude the gain on sale, you know, PTL income was up Year-over-Year overall. Should we expect that kind of cadence to continue here in the second half and just maybe, you know, if you could give us some broader outlook around, you know, where we are in the freight cycle and when you could expect that to reinfect. I have a quick follow up.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

From the operating side, when you look at the quarter, our gain on sale was AUD 44 million last year and the quarter was AUD 16 million, so obviously down AUD 28 million. Our guys did a great job from an operating standpoint. As I look out into Q3 and Q4, basically gain on sale will be a real trigger up or down based on what the market pricing is. We have some disposals that we'll look at. We dropped 14,000 units out of our fleet during the quarter. I think it's important, or through the year, I'm sorry, I think it's important that we look at gain on sale or loss or what have it might be. At the end of the day, freight is still flat. That freight obviously will drive excess rental from our existing lease customers and also from just a casual renter.

I think that will be the driver. If I look at the numbers in the quarter, our lease revenue, I think we talked about it before, 5%-6%, and logistics was up 1% and rental was down 9%. You can see overall cost controls. The gain on sale really gave us a return of over AUD 50 million. If you looked at that for the rest of the year, it would be about AUD 200 million. Again, that can be affected by gain on sale.

Rajat Gupta (Research Analyst)

Understood, that's clear. Just a broader question on capital allocation. If you take into account the extra AUD 150 million you are going to be getting from the tax bill changes, I mean, that's a pretty step change in your cash flow profile. I'm curious, does that in any way change how you are thinking about capital allocation? You know, maybe being more aggressive on share buyback versus, you know, or just like other forms of use of cash? If you could just tell us if you are looking to reprioritize that. Thank you.

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

Hey, Rashad, it's Shelley. It certainly provides us with more opportunity. And as we, as I said before, we're going to continue to weigh current market conditions. You know, the first half of 2025 certainly had a bit of tariff uncertainty. You saw us, as well as some of our peers, really look to take advantage of, you know, a down market and focus on buybacks. We are always going to remain focused on our dividend. Year to date, about AUD 300 million of return to shareholders. We've started to see folks come out and make some purchases and acquisitions, and we're still focused on growing that side of the business as well. I think it'll be a tale of two halves, and we will certainly look at different market conditions, but the additional AUD 150 million benefit that we're estimating certainly helps provide us with more opportunity.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

I would say, from an M&A perspective, you know, obviously our doors are open and, you know, we're looking at a decent pipeline right now. How those will mature, I can't say, but certainly we'll look to do M&A, more M&A, obviously, in the last six months than we did in the first six. Kelly, that would be probably fair.

Shelley Hulgrave (EVP and CFO)

Right.

Understood. Thanks for all the color and good luck.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

All right, thanks, Rajat.

Operator (participant)

Our last question comes from David Whiston from Morningstar. Please go ahead. Your line is open.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Hey, David.

David Whiston (Senior Equity Analyst specializing)

Hey, everyone.

Thanks for taking my question.

I wanted to stick on the M&A topic, actually, because if I.

Remember correctly, you've talked in the past.

About wanting to acquire AUD 1.5 billion in annual revenue, and you've just done the.

Ferrari deal so far.

Even if you do end up.

Closing some of these deals in your.

Pipeline, do you think the AUD 1.5 billion.

Acquired number for 25 is still on.

The table or is it going to be lower?

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

I would say it's not realistic to think we're going to on an annualized basis. Maybe we could look at it. But, you know, I guess if I had the perfect storm, I'd like to grow 5% organically and 5% through acquisition. Now, we're not meeting those targets right now, but certainly in the capital position we're in from, certainly from an acquisition standpoint, you know, we really should be in, really in good shape. When you look at the capital allocation, you know, we had a strong cash flow of AUD 472 million from operations. Certainly with the uncertainty that followed the tariffs, I think that we have to. We paused and I think that certainly made a difference. We've talked about 1.3% of the outstanding shares. We purchased already about 900,000, and we paid out AUD 165 million in dividends.

I think the shareholder themselves is getting a benefit from dividends. I think the yield at 3.1% is strong. We're certainly paying out at over 35% roughly in payout. We're going to hit all those levers. Trust me, we are definitely looking at acquisitions. What I don't want to do, I think Ferrari was kind of a special one when you think about that brand. We're the largest dealer in the world and we had the ability to have the house dealership next door was key. As we look at these, we want to be sure that we can tuck things in where we have scale, look at markets and, you know, we're going to be prudent as our peers have been.

I think with the size of the US Auto market, when we look at internationally, these businesses have an opportunity to grow through acquisition for many years to come.

David Whiston (Senior Equity Analyst specializing)

Thanks for that.

Just one other question on Porsche.

Australia, you mentioned the used to new.

Ratio has already doubled in about a year's time.

I'm just curious, was that mostly?

Due to a lot more advertising or just changing internal operations at those stores?

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Look, let me ask, let Randall Seymore, he's calling in from the U.K. hopefully we connect you around. You want to make a comment on what you've been able to accomplish in Australia in just less than a year.

Randall Seymore (COO of International Operations)

Sure, no problem.

Good question.

This was mostly internal. In fact, it was virtually all internal processes relative to just taking advantage, focusing on getting more trades, whether it be on selling a new or used, the efficiency of reconditioning, the marketing them properly. The big opportunity, a lot of the independent used car providers were getting a lot of these cars. We are just organically keeping them and then we're opportunistically out there buying them as well. You know, it was a big focus and team did a great job.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

That business really has turned out to be really amazing when you think about it. We have the three stores in the big city of Melbourne, Randall, and the team we're really looking at is one dealership with three. Three locations in the city. We can combine customer service, one inventory for all three dealerships and the marketing, I think it's really key. We have the benefit of our commercial businesses taking place in Australia. You know, our financing, our legal, our insurance, our HR, all of those functions are we can take the advantage of those in our auto business and will give us a runway, hopefully to continue to grow the auto business in Australia as we go forward.

I think we need to get the Porsche dealerships solid and have a year or so under our belt, but we certainly would look, is that a place that we could grow some of our business with our expertise.

David Whiston (Senior Equity Analyst specializing)

Great.

Thanks, everyone.

Roger Penske (Chair and CEO)

Thank you.

All right, everyone, thanks for joining us today. I think it was a great quarter, as we said earlier, lots of moving parts, but I think the management team we have across all aspects of the business has really been great. I think our turnover is the lowest in the industry and I think that provides us the best management. Look forward to talking to you next quarter.

Thank you.

Operator (participant)

This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.