Hey, good morning, everyone. Welcome to the half year results presentation. Thanks everyone for taking the time to join the call today. With me is Aaron Saunders, our Group CFO. So, two of us will go through the presentation this morning, and then open up at the end for Q&A. So you can either just put in a question into the Q&A or just raise your hand and we can open up the audio for you, whatever you choose. So yeah, usual sort of agenda. We'll give a quick overview of the half. Aaron will take us through the financial performance. I'm gonna go through the segment results and then a few comments around our outlook. So yeah, just starting with some highlights.
So yeah, we're very pleased with the six months just completed. It's another record result for the business. So continuing to grow earnings despite the macro challenges, particularly impacting our Finance division. Three out of the four businesses, so Auto Retail, Insurance and Credit Management, are all well ahead of prior year profit contributions, and I think the Auto Retail division is clearly a standout performance, growing their volume and market share in the used car segment. Finance continues to be impacted by rising interest rates, but these interest rates will become a tailwind for us once their easing cycle starts kicking in. But we're pleased to see that interest rates have stabilized as well as our, as well as our margins. The wider New Zealand used car market is up 6%, year-to-date.
So the graph here shows you the April - September six-month period. So you can see we've just popped up over the bottom of last year. But it's fair to say that the number of transactions has been skewed somewhat by quite a large number of pre-registrations of used imports in June, which was in advance of the changes to the Clean Car Discount program. I think the dominant trend that we are seeing, though, is that demand for high-value cars continues to moderate and strengthen at those lower price point segments. We'll sort of touch on that a bit later on. The Turners brand continues to grow from strength to strength. And I've shown this graph before, we need to dedicate the source of this to our mates at Forsyth Barr, actually.
The Google searches for Turners Cars continues to outpace searches for used cars, so it gives us a good sense of our sort of mindshare and ownership of the used car category. The combined effect of branch expansion, improved customer experience, digital marketing, brand investment, are certainly doing the job for us in Auto Retail. And you can see registered dealer numbers have plateaued sort of down around that sort of 2,900 level. On the sort of fleet transition, at the end of September, EVs made up around 2% of the total New Zealand vehicle fleet, so there was just over 90,000 battery EVs or plug-in hybrid EVs. And while it's growing strongly, there is still a long way to go in this fleet transition, that is clear.
From our own sales side of things, we're seeing, you know, good growth in our, in our own sales of, of low-emitting vehicles. So in September 2023, we had just under 10% of our total sales being an EV or a hybrid vehicle. Results-wise, yeah, really pleased with the six months, and we've seen, you know, strong growth in revenues, EBIT and pre-tax profit. EPS up 7%, and off the back of that six months, Directors have declared a fully imputed Q2 dividend of NZD 0.06 per share, so up NZD 0.01 on the same period for last year. In Q3, we've seen volumes and margins holding up well in car sales, and, and our damaged vehicle volumes have still been at very strong levels, which is, which is good to see.
In Finance, yeah, it feels like the economic environment is certainly reducing SMEs' cash buffer for to sort of sustain themselves from shock events. You know, our expectation will be that if unemployment continues to lift, there will have to be some flow-through impact into arrears. Insurance claims continue to track below expectations, and obviously, the flip side to the interest rate impact in Finance is that we get some benefit through the Insurance business, through our investment returns. In the Credit Management business, corporate debt load has been recovering slower than we expected it to. But SME debt load is increasing quite quickly at the moment, as the New Zealand credit metrics continue to deteriorate. Okay, I'll hand over to Aaron now to take us through our financial results in a bit more detail.
Thanks, Todd, and good morning, everyone. So, pretty pleasing jump in revenue and EBIT over the first six months of the year, up 16% on prior, and there's a little bit of an element of a recovery from... It's a long time ago now, but, the effect of Omicron on the first half of, the last financial year. So our net profit after tax, up 9.5%, and NPAT up 8%. That reflects a slightly lower effective tax rate in the last financial year. In terms of revenue growth, yeah, obviously, the standout is Auto, and that's a function of a 6% increase in total car units sold over the period.
So that's both owned and consigned units in total, and a 31% increase in damaged and end-of-life vehicles sold. In Finance, revenue growth reflects our efforts in repricing the loan book over the last 18 months, offset by-
Sorry, excuse me.
... Offset by a slight reduction in total receivables at 30 September. Insurance revenue gains are coming from higher levels of policy sales and our kind of repricing efforts in that portfolio. And Credit Management revenue, as Todd alluded to, is increasing off higher levels of debt loaded. How that translates into profit before tax, obviously, Auto Retail result underpinned by growth in car units sold, a slight tick up in margin, as well as an improved Finance attach rate in the first half. And we also sold high numbers of damaged vehicle units. We expect that market share gains and new branch growth will lock these improvements in. Finance, as we've well signaled, has been, you know, impacted by rising interest rates and that slight drop in total receivables.
The Insurance result reflects an improvement in investment returns and continued efficiencies in our claims handling performance. In credit, performance improvement from increasing levels of debt load as parts of the economy go under increasing pressure, and corporate costs are up off the back of higher interest rates. This slide, you know, clearly highlights that super growth in Auto, and which now, in that first half, made up 56% of group profits. It does also highlight the mix of annuity and activity profit streams, which we feel provides earnings diversification as well as stability during difficult times. It is worth repeating that the Finance division is still really operating with one hand tied behind its back.
You know, we expect the headwind of rising interest rates to turn into a tailwind at some stage over the next 12 months-18 months. Pleased to note, we've been growing dividends for almost a decade in Turners, and the dividend reinvestment plan gives shareholders the option of converting their dividend to shares at a discount of 2%. We are currently projecting that our full-year dividends will be at least NZD 0.24 a share, and based on a share price of around NZD 4.25, we feel this gives a very attractive gross dividend yield running at just under 8%. In terms of the balance sheet, it's worth calling out that inventory levels, despite higher sales, inventory levels are down.
That's a reflection on faster stock turn and a deliberate strategy to buy less expensive units, really to reflect where demand is strongest in the market. Finance receivables are down slightly from the September 2022 high water mark, and that's a reflection of our deliberate strategy to prioritize quality and margin over loan book growth. Property, plant, and equipment have increased due to the acquisition and development of new sites in Timaru and Napier, and also the expansion of our Christchurch footprint. Our borrowings have largely mirrored the reduction in Finance receivables. Some further color on our funding mix. The key change in the funding mix is the introduction of another party to our securitization facilities. This provides the company with further diversification in funding sources, which we are certainly pleased with.
We also received a very positive rating from Fitch as part of this process, with a AAA rating achieved on the pool of Oxford receivables we sold into the new warehouse. We're still very comfortable with debt levels and debt capacity in the business. We have capacity to support Oxford lending for around the next 12 months and to complete the committed property projects that we have underway. Back to you, Todd.
Great. Thanks, Aaron. Okay, we'll just work through the segments now. Yeah, so Auto Retail revenue up 20%, reflecting sort of an increase in both consignment and owned units across the year. Total car sales are up 6% over the last half year, and also reflects growth in our damaged and end-of-life vehicle units. So, as Aaron mentioned, segment profits up 62% for the six months, which is just an outstanding result from our team operating that business. As you can see from the graph, you know, retail market share has continued to improve, and you always have a couple of dips when the Clean Car Discount pre-registrations flow through the market, so you can see that we've just called out those little dips there.
But you know, clearly the overarching trend is our market share continues to improve and our damaged and end-of-life vehicle unit sales are up 31%, you know, from the tail of the weather events earlier this year. And also just the continued growth of units that are uneconomic to repair being reflecting the aged vehicle fleet. We're really pleased with the continued growth in our sourcing capability and improvement in our sourcing capability. So that continues to improve through the investment we're making in lead generation, the pricing tools that we're using, and pricing strategies that we're implementing. And we continue to position our stock acquisition for where the demand in the market is strongest through the use of our data analytics.
So almost nine out of 10 cars in our inventory is now less than NZD 15,000 in price point, and that's probably... Well, the comparison would probably be more like seven or eight this time last year. The damaged and end-of-life vehicle volumes continue to track up. Accident damage vehicles and older vehicles are getting more expensive to repair through parts and labor inflation. And vehicles are more technical, which means insurers are writing off more vehicles as uneconomic to repair, and we are a beneficiary of that. And clearly, weather events are also leading to more cars being written off by insurers as well. So that trend, we would expect to continue. Our pipeline of branch expansion projects is growing nicely. We now have Timaru open and trading very well.
So we've been open for just on a week or so, and can say that we've sold 20 cars in Timaru so far, and bought, I think, close to 50 cars out of the local region. So yeah, really pleased with the early response from customers in that region. Our new larger Napier site's on track to open in January. So we're getting close. We've had a few sort of slight delays there with council down there and consenting. I think they've had a fair bit on their plate, so it's probably not that surprising that we've had a few delays. And we're certainly seeing more property opportunity come to market as interest rates and holding costs impact landholders.
I think our ability to act quickly is really helping to convert a number of these into owned sites. And a number of these have Christchurch properties we've been able to buy have been very good examples of those. We do have strong conviction that owning these strategic sites is very important to the long-term value creation for all shareholders, both through protecting the locations that we operate in and creating value through land prices appreciating over time. That's just a photo of our Timaru branch. So you can see Tina there on the digital board, signboard there. And yeah, place is looking fantastic. So that's yeah, on State Highway 1, approaching from the north of Timaru. But a super location there. You know, very, very visible.
This is a shot from just at the end of last week of our Napier site. So you can see, buildings are basically completed. The internal fit-out's going on at the moment and a bit of work still to do on the yard, but again, we'll have a really highly visible site, double the size of our current operation in Napier. So we're, you know, we're expecting, you know, good things from that investment. In Finance, pleased to say that we're now starting to see growth in the loan book again. So we sort of bottomed out there in June.
But since then, we've seen, you know, good, you know, small, small amount of growth, but we're back in growth mode, which is great, just off the back of stronger, premium consumer lending. What we are pleased about, though, is our best performing lending from a margin and arrears measure perspective is Turners. The loans we originate out of Turners and our direct channel, which is up 24%, year-on-year. We've also continued to adjust our credit policy through this first six months. That has been the right thing to do. So we've certainly been conservative, and we're certainly keeping an eye on what we think is coming at us.
Also pleased that we've still retained the economic provision buffer, so the NZD 2 million overlay that we had set at March 2023 remains at NZD 2 million, at the end of September. Yeah, interest expense has grown at an incredible pace over the last two years, and clearly this has had a material impact on our net interest margin. I think the good news, though, is that the impact of the rising OCR is starting to slow down. We've seen net interest margin stabilize, and we're expecting expansion sort of in the second half to occur. And that will gather pace as the OCR easing cycle kicks in, whenever that may be. But we know that there's a tailwind coming back for Oxford Finance, which is good.
As we've been consistently talking about, our focus on quality has seen our credit metrics continue to improve. You can see on the left-hand side there, you know, we're now into our fourth year of new business being written at above the average credit score for the New Zealand auto loan portfolio. So that puts us in a very good position to weather any increase in our, in the New Zealand unemployment rate. Kind of no surprise that with our focus on bringing better quality borrowers into the loan book, our arrears level has continued to outperform the broader market. Yeah, I'm very pleased with that, that we're tracking sort of around half of what the total auto loan portfolio is in terms of arrears.
Also, hardship numbers in the book are running at very low levels. S o, right on 50 at the 30th of September, and just to put that in perspective, we have, you know, over 28,000 customers in Oxford, so to have 50 in hardship is again, a good reflection of the quality of that book. In Insurance, we've seen revenue growth of 5% and profits up 14% in the first half. Yeah, continuing market share gains, which is delivering good, robust policy sales, despite some challenging market conditions and growth in the net earned premium, combined with the investment returns, all help deliver positive profit growth. And you can see here, we've just added in a graph, just highlighting this sort of effect that we're seeing around claims cost inflation.
That is a real thing in this business. B ut being offset by the frequency of claims reducing. W e think that is just due to people driving a bit less with working from home as a phenomenon, and also just with the cost of living pressures and the price of fuel and things. In Credit Management, we've certainly turned a corner, which is good to see, revenue being up 8% and profits up 29% for the half. Debt value loaded up and debt collected is up off the back of that, and an increasing number of customer defaults. Again, probably hasn't been as strong the debt load, particularly from corporates and banks, in particular.
But, you know, I suppose the thing that we do reflect on here is that Centrix are reporting that current New Zealand-wide arrears levels are now tracking above 2018, after coming off those historic lows through the pandemic. And that trend we're expecting to continue to worsen over coming months. EC Credit is very well positioned to help those corporate and SME clients with that hard-to-collect debt. You've heard me talk about this sort of basic formula before, and I just wanted to mention that we talk a lot internally about this. We're really pleased with the high levels of engagement, that we have across the business.
So, you know, our simple formula is that if we provide a great employee experience, then our team have the best chance to create a great customer experience, and the combination of those two things should deliver a great shareholder experience. Yeah, we are absolute believers in the benefits of a high-performing and strong culture, and there is definitely, in our view, a strong correlation to business performance. So, you know, we continue to invest as a team in building and maintaining that strong culture. And another sort of layer on that is our employee share scheme uptake, which is now 50% across the team.
So we have sort of one in two of our team, both highly engaged and owners of shares in this business, which we think, just kind of makes a very, very powerful combination in, in terms of helping us execute our plans. Okay, let me just wrap up with a few things around outlook. So, yeah, we've used this table over the last three reporting periods to, just to help highlight to shareholders and investors how we see the risks and what we're doing to mitigate those risks. And that's given us now an opportunity to sort of track the impact of these risks as well. So pleased to say that two of the risks we feel are now off the table.
So supply chain and recruitment and retention of people, both those things really aren't featuring on, in terms of our what occupies our minds. I would say the regulatory risk is, has probably shifted to low. There are, you know, some likely changes if, you know, assuming the National government say will do what they say they will do around reviewing the CC CFA and potentially removing the Clean Car Discount. But, you know, both of those things we're not, we're not worried about. And obviously, the interest rate risk we've shifted to low as well, because we are now at the, it would seem, at the top of the top of that cycle and an easing cycle is likely to be the next move.
We do think recession and sort of the overall impact on demand and loan defaults, we would still call out at a medium risk level in our view. We're comfortable that we are doing the right things to mitigate those risks, but certainly want to, want to call that out and make sure that shareholders understand how we think about that. On the trading outlook, we expect to see upside from our new branches in Q4 for Auto Retail. Timaru's open, trading well, and obviously we have Napier, Napier coming on stream. We're continuing to target our sourcing in those high-demand segments, and we think that is, you know, clearly critical to maintaining our momentum.
In Finance, quality metrics still remain a key priority for us, particularly as economic conditions sort of feel like they're likely to impact arrears more acutely. Margins we expect to expand in the near term, you know, although there is still some sensitivity to the OCR track if it were to move up. In Insurance, we expect the claims ratios to be stable, and that drop in frequency offsets any further claims inflation, and policy sales, you know, should be robust. In Credit Management, yeah, we're already seeing the kind of offset of the economic conditions and their performance in the resultant debt, lift in debt loads from corporate and SME clients. So we're well positioned to take advantage of that next stage of the credit cycle.
Yeah, we're just sort of reaffirming our October guidance. Probably no surprises there that, given, wasn't that long ago that we updated the market. So, you know, reaffirming guidance that FY 2024 result will be ahead of the record FY 2024, 2023 result. Yeah, in terms of what's next for us, yeah, I think the Turners business is continuing to show great resilience in the face of, you know, pretty challenging market, market conditions. Still feel like there is a lot of opportunity in the used car space. I always like to remind people about the 20% of cars, one in five, that are 20 years or old, that, you know, we benefit from that replacement demand, but also, flow-on supply into our damaged and end-of-life vehicle division.
So we get, you know, we get two bites at that cherry. And also that strong Auto Retail business is having a very good halo effect into Oxford Finance and into Autosure Insurance, so. And when those interest rates start coming off, that will be a tailwind for our Finance business. And as we grow the Auto Retail network, we are certainly keeping a keen eye on the increasing number of good property acquisition opportunities in key strategic locations.
And we've seen that we are getting very close to the NZX 50, so we're, you know, we're, we're looking forward to the announcement early December to hopefully confirm, that move, which will be, you know, I think a good endorsement and reflection of the great work that a, that a large team of people have put in over the last sort of five or six years to really grow this business. Okay, well, we'll, pause there and, just see if we can open up for some Q&A. So, let's start with, Grant. So just bear with me for a second here, guys. Okay, Grant, we've opened you up.
Oh. Hi guys. Can you hear me okay?
Yeah, we can. Yeah.
Yeah.
I'll just tune you up so I can, we can hear you.
Okay, great.
Okay.
Excellent. Great result, guys. Just, three or four from me. Just in terms of the margin, so you've got on the Auto Retail slide there around margins being up 66% on owned vehicles. Obviously, that's a great result. Can you just remind us what the, the dollar figure is, and then what the breakdown of that 66% growth is in broad terms?
Yep, yep, I can do that. I anticipated you might ask a question like that, Grant. So yeah, I mean, essentially, the margin increase reflects our increasing efforts to source locally, because we, you know, we're then buying and selling on the same market. And our consequent reduction in used import volumes. But broadly speaking, the GP after fees, so we treat ourselves from a management reporting perspective in the same way we treat a third-party vendor. And that is we charge, you know, ensure that we charge ourselves fees and that our buyer fees are charged on those sales. So, you know, that number is running at, internally is running at, just over NZD 1,000 a unit now, which is significantly up on the first half of last year.
And yeah, I think, again, it's a kind of a testament to the fact that we are in more places, and we provide a very good service and solution to people who are looking to to move their car on. And also that we've pivoted really to where the demand is strongest in the market, which is in that sort of sub NZD 15,000 space, where, you know, demand is really robust.
I think it's probably fair to say, Aaron, as well, that sort of less imports has ironed out a bit of volatility in those margin numbers-
Yeah.
... as well. Yeah.
Got it. Okay, that, that's great. In terms of the, so, so it looks like interest rates have, you know, sort of settled down and, you know, latest curve suggesting a, a, they'll come back as, as you've sort of noted. And it looks like just looking at some of the credit sort of metrics that you provide, that, that credit quality has sort of stabilized at least, half- on- half in terms of credit scores or percentage of new premium lending. How are you thinking about with, with NIM and credit quality sort of stabilized, how are you thinking about growth in the receivables book going forward? Should we expect to see, some growth in that, with those two dynamics sort of settled down now? Or is it, are you waiting to see how the economic cycle plays out?
No, we've had a small pivot back towards growth, Grant. So in that, in that last sort of three months, we saw some ledger growth, and, and I'd expect that that would continue. Generally, you know, in terms of the cycle, it's a good time to grow when your credit policy is at its tightest, which is, you know, I'd describe as around about now. So, you know, we feel that the new business we're originating now is, is going to stand up pretty well, notwithstanding it, it would seem that unemployment rates are gonna rise over the next sort of six to 12 months.
Yeah. Okay. No, that's great. And then in terms of the NIM, yeah, it looks like it's ticked down very modestly in the half. I appreciate it's probably, probably done better in the second quarter. Where do you see that sort of stabilizing at, on the current loan quality settings? I'm thinking sort of 9%, including commissions that you, you posted for FY 2023 as the full year. Where do you see that as a sort of a long run for where we are now?
Yeah, it's a good question. I mean, I would say that I would expect over the next couple of years that that'll expand again to, you know, by another sort of 100 basis points-200 basis points. It won't obviously go back to the levels it was at when we were, you know, lending on a slightly higher risk basis. But yeah, there's 100 basis points-200 basis points over the next couple of years, as kind of the, you know, OCR returns to a more neutral rate.
Yeah. Okay, great. The last one for me. So you've held the guidance of effectively NZD 45.5+ million, after delivering NZD 25.7 million. So obviously that implies some conservatism around the second half. How are you thinking about the second half at the moment? I appreciate these damaged vehicles was a bit of a bump in the first half and a few other things. How are you thinking about that second half dynamic?
Yeah. Yeah. So there was that bump in terms of flood write-offs. I would say, you know, there is some seasonality in our result. You know, second half is always a bit weaker than the first half in pure dollar terms because of the kind of, you know, December- January effect, where you almost lose a month over the Christmas period. Yeah, I mean, the other sort of single point to call out is the timing of Easter is quite different this year, so it kind of... Easter is right over that last sort of weekend of March, which we are anticipating will having, have some impact on the March result.
So, yeah, I would say that it would be a surprise if the first half was as, you know, as much above... Sorry, if the second half was as far above the comparative as we've seen in this half. A nd I wouldn't be surprised if the result was closer to flat on the second half of last year just in particular with that kind of Easter effect kicking in.
That's great. Okay, thanks, team. Cheers.
Thanks, Grant. James Lindsay, we'll hand over to you. You can-
Yeah, thanks, gents. Again, congratulations or maybe more so to Tina for the great result.
We can pull her over if you want.
Exactly. Hey, a few from us as well, if we can. Maybe just talk about the success just across the country, sort of Auckland versus the rest of the country first.
Yeah. I mean, the regions have been pretty strong for us over the first half. I mean, not that the main centers haven't, but I think they'd typically outperform, say, Auckland, just on a market, you know, kind of comparative market share basis, James.
Yeah, I think also, you know, Auckland, where people are probably more highly leveraged, seen the most, or the biggest sort of cost of living impact. A nd, you know, similarly starting to notice a few cool winds blow in Wellington, you know, reflecting, you know, that sort of impending change in government.
Yeah, good color. Thanks. And then obviously just with the success of owned cars, just how far through you think that sort of transition of being able to move stuff to having it sell owning it versus auction?
Well, we're-- Yeah, so that's that sort of wholesale to retail shift, James, you're talking about?
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah, we've made some good progress with the lease companies in the first half. Yeah, it's a slow burn. But, you know, we're certainly getting traction around, you know, the logic that supports that shift. Sometimes it's a little more difficult just to get the actual behavior to change, and, you know, they have their own pressures as well around funding and large fleets of the same vehicle coming through. So often that auction wholesale channel will be, you know, the optimal channel for them to sell the product through. But, you know, we're pleased with the traction that we're getting.
Just in terms of sort of capacity as far as having retail versus auction, is there any issues with regard to, you know, to that? Or is it just very easy for people to have one or the other?
Yeah, there's no issues around capacity. Although what we have seen is quite a significant lift in consignment vehicles from those lease companies coming through in that first half. I think as the sort of supply chain around new cars has eased up, and I think particularly the consumer demand just drift off, the sort of back orders and things for those lease companies have started to kick in. So our lease volumes are up kind of 15%, year-on-year, from as a result of that.
All right, cool. And you called out our sort of finance and attach rates. Yeah, just with regard to sort of the opportunity there and transition over the next few years about what could be the potential of getting higher attach rates.
Yeah, well, it's always a case of getting everyone performing at sort of the highest level. I mean, we had branches in the network that would hit north of 40%, consistently in terms of their attach rates. You know, overall, we're at... What are we at? 33%, isn't it? 34%. So, you know, we still see there's opportunity there, for sure.
Yep, and then the last one from me is just, you know, with regard to what Aaron was talking about, the margin on those own cars and just the sustainability of that. You're comfortable that you are able to sort of continue to achieve that NZD 1,000, or do you think the dynamics of your relatively low import cars over this time period with the sort of Clean Car Discount stuff has actually helped it out, to be, yeah, to a greater extent?
It's a good question, James. I mean, I think if you, yeah, whilst import has, imports have kind of been a sort of a marginal impact, and the really, the big driver for the increase is that, we're not getting as many wrong. And if, if or when we do get them wrong, because we, you know, you always get some wrong, they're, they're snowflakes, basically, the losses aren't as significant. S o, it doesn't take as many good units to make up for the odd bad one. So I, yeah, I'm pretty confident that margins feel sustainable, and people have been asking us now for three or four years when margins are going to drop back and, and, and they haven't.
You know, I think obviously the proof will be in the pudding, but I'm pretty confident there's resilience there.
Yeah, I agree with Aaron's comments, James, unsurprisingly. But, you know, the way I sort of think about it is that we're sourcing much more, much more of that stock locally now. It's turning faster, you know, compared to an import, used import, which takes us, you know, anywhere up to kind of two to three months to get it here plus some refurb, plus you've got exchange rate risk. There's just a lot more variables kind of going on in that space. A nd I think it's, you know, we're getting, as Aaron said, better at buying locally, and kind of we've just taken a bunch of volatility out of the mix of those cars that we sell with fewer imports.
So, yeah, I think it's a very fair assumption to say that we can be consistently delivering at that level.
Maybe just an extension on that is sort of how from a systems sort of IT perspective, as far as doing that pricing, how much of an advantage is sort of a nationwide sourcing and being able to see what's selling where and things like that as an advantage versus sort of more localized agent or car sales guys?
Yeah. I mean, well, I think, I think it's a massive advantage basically. You know, the fact that we're selling 40,000 cars a year, and we've got all the pricing data on those cars, I think is a huge advantage. Plus you'd start layering in sort of the web analytics that we're getting now for where people are looking and the price points. It's just giving us a better view of kind of where demand is tracking to. And I think we're doing a better job of kind of communicating amongst those, that buying team, and not just buying in the moment. B ut having a forward view of what is going on in the market and where are the shifts likely to occur.
So yeah, there's a... I mean, it's like anything, there's a whole bunch of little things which kind of combine to driving these improvements and these results. So yeah, but I think that data is a massive advantage for us.
Great! That's it from us, and look forward to getting invited to the 10% share party as well when that's through.
Sounds good.
Thanks.
Cheers. Hey, Kieran, we'll go to you. I know you typed a few messages in there, but it's probably easier to ask them, isn't it?
Yeah, it is. Thanks, guys, and, congratulations on the great result. Just a couple from me. First of all, just with the registered dealer numbers, they seem to have stabilized a little bit in recent months. Just interested to get your view on that, and whether you think there's any more consolidation in the market to come. And, you know, perhaps that'll, how that'll link through to your market share gains from this point.
Yeah, I mean, that's been a little bit of a surprise to us, Kieran, that dealer numbers haven't continued to track back. I think there's a pretty strong relationship to the strength of the Kiwi Yen, and the, you know, the relative attractiveness of the used car market for importers in particular, which is, you know, which is where the swing volume comes from. So, you know, with the Kiwi Yen up at 89, I think that there's people who are, you know, if not coming back to market, then certainly not considering leaving at the moment. So long term, I think, you know, we're still over-dealed as a country.
We've, you know, we've got 25% more dealers per head than Australia and North America. Y ou know, it feels like that over the long term, there'll be further kind of consolidation or aggregation. But you're right, it has had a pause.
Cool. Thank you. Then just looking at your commission and sales revenue, you know, in 1H 2024, it was NZD 45.3 million, up from NZD 36.1 million in the first half of last year. Can you just provide some further detail there and, and perhaps break down, you know, what was a one-off impact due to those weather events?
Yeah, that's a good question. I would put in the first half of the year, you know, just off the top of my head, I would put that weather impact at least NZD 1 million, somewhere between NZD 1 million and NZD 1.5 million. We've also had, y ou know, we've made some pricing movements. S o we've, you know, looked to sort of push through CPI increases across cars, damaged vehicles, and our trucks and machinery business. So that's been another impact, if you like. So yeah, combination of volume both in cars and damaged vehicles and trucks and machinery, for that matter, and price rises.
Cool. Thank you. And then last one, just around your hedging profile in Oxford. So you've put it up to 74%. You know, what's, what's the plan in that respect, kind of as we come into an environment where interest rates are either holding flat or sort of coming down into next year? How are you thinking about your hedging profile?
Well, we've kind of... I mean, I think it's probably increased. I'm comfortable with, you know, where it's sitting now, given that the expectation is that interest rates will start to fall back towards a more neutral rate over the next 12 months, 18 months, or 24 months. Yeah, I think that we'll probably take this sort of position somewhere between sort of 65% and 80% going forward, just because the size of the finance book means that, you know, we, we'll want to remove the volatility that, you know, we've seen over the last sort of two or three years.
Great. Thanks, guys. That's all from me.
Thanks, Kieran.
Thanks, Kieran.
Okay, David, you should be able to chat now.
Okay, great. Thank you. I just have one question, if I may. Could you just remind me, the sort of nuance in your auction commission and other revenue line, the difference between auction commissions at a point in time and commission and other revenue over time? It seems to me that that latter over time number has gone up materially in the first half relative to the PCP, and I just can't remember what the sort of difference is between that and a point-in-time sales, and if there's anything worth calling out there. Thank you.
Good question, David. So the point in time is the revenue that we receive from both buyers and sellers when we sell a unit or a car unit or a damaged vehicle or a truck. Over time, it is probably a better proxy for the work that we're doing on vehicles. So best way to explain that is you think about it if we groom a retail vehicle. So as we shift more cars into retail, we do more grooming, and because you do a groom and you earn some revenue from that, but you really only, you know, you kind of earn the revenue when you sell the unit, not when you necessarily perform the work. So that's the distinction between a point in time and over time, if you like, in those categories.
And we did see an increase in pass-through costs for things like storage as a function of that jump in damaged vehicle volumes. So there's a bunch of sort of moving parts, but largely speaking, the more cars we retail, the more we do on those cars for our vendors in particular the lease companies, and the more of those costs that we recover.
Thank you. That, that... You've just reminded me, there's, there's some kind of cost offset number somewhere in your P&L as well, isn't there, that reflects those grooming costs, et cetera?
Yeah. So we eliminate the costs on the units that we own ourselves. You know, because essentially it's an internal charge, so they get eliminated at consolidated level. So you know, what you're more seeing is a reflection of increasing spend to refurbish third-party vendors' vehicles.
Right. Okay, that makes sense. Thank you very much.
Great. Cheers, David. Okay, I'll just check there's no questions on the Q&A. Looks like those are just from Kieran, so covered those off. So, here's your last chance. If you'd like to ask a question, you can raise your hand or or type something into the Q&A quickly. We'll give it, give people a couple of moments if there is anything. Okay, well, looks like we've set aside everyone's questions for now. Thanks very much for your interest and your attendance this morning. And, yeah, if you have any other questions or would like to talk to Aaron and I about anything please, you know, feel free to get in touch with us directly as well. So, have a great morning everyone, and we'll catch up soon.
Thanks, everyone.
See you later.