Matson reports Q2 EPS $2.26, consensus $1.92

Reports Q2 revenue $773.4M, two estimates $762.35M. “Matson’s Ocean Transportation and Logistics business segments performed well despite a challenging business environment and sluggish economic growth,” said Chairman and CEO, Matt Cox. “Within Ocean Transportation, our China service saw higher sequential quarterly freight demand but generated lower year-over-year volume and freight rates, which were the primary contributors to the year-over-year decline in our consolidated operating income. Currently in the Transpacific marketplace, we are seeing modest reductions in deployed capacity and retail inventories are in a relatively better position than earlier in the year, but retailers continue to carefully manage inventory levels in the face of lower consumer demand. We further expect the tradelane to experience a muted peak season, but for Matson, we expect our China service to be near full during the traditional peak season. Absent an economic ‘hard landing’ in the U.S., we continue to expect trade dynamics to gradually improve for the remainder of the year as the Transpacific marketplace transitions to a more normalized level of consumer demand and retail inventory stocking levels. Regardless of the economic environment, we expect to continue to earn a significant rate premium to the Shanghai Containerized Freight Index reflecting our fast and reliable ocean services and unmatched destination services.”