The Atlanta-based company, whose shares were down nearly 3 percent, said net income rose to $126.1 million, or 75 cents per share, in the fourth quarter from $119.5 million, or 70 cents per share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 3 percent to $2.63 billion.
DETROIT (Reuters) - Genuine Parts Co <GPC.N>, a distributor of automotive and industrial replacement parts, posted a 5.5 percent rise in quarterly earnings on Tuesday, falling short of Wall Street expectations as auto-related sales growth sputtered.
The Atlanta-based company, whose shares were down nearly 3 percent, said net income rose to $126.1 million, or 75 cents per share, in the fourth quarter from $119.5 million, or 70 cents per share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 3 percent to $2.63 billion.
Automotive sales, which represent almost half of total revenue, grew just 2 percent to $1.27 billion, down from 3 percent growth in the third quarter. The company had forecast an improved performance.
Analysts' average fourth-quarter forecast had been for earnings of 76 cents per share on revenue of $2.66 billion, according to Reuters Estimates.
!ADVERTISEMENT!On a conference call with analysts, company executives forecast 2008 sales would rise by between 3 percent and 6 percent because of the slower economy -- a forecast the company characterized as "cautious."
Genuine Parts forecast full-year earnings per share of between $3.12 and $3.22, a gain of between 5 percent and 8 percent compared with 2007 results.
JP Morgan analyst Himanshu Patel said in a note for clients that Genuine Parts appeared to have been hurt in the fourth quarter by the weakness in the auto industry, which many analysts see heading for a third year of declining sales in the United States.
Shares were down $1.24 to $43.81 in early afternoon trade on the New York Stock Exchange.
(Reporting by Kevin Krolicki, editing by John Wallace, Gunna Dickson)
