LITTLE ROCK — Van Buren-based USA Truck reported a $3.1 million net loss for its fourth quarter Thursday, which the company called an improvement when compared with its $4.4 million net loss for the same quarter a year ago.
President and Chief Executive Officer Cliff Beckham said in a release that better operating fundamentals that came late in the third quarter carried over into the fourth quarter, helping to narrow the company’s losses.
USA Truck reported a net loss of 30 cents per share for the quarter ending December 31, compared with a net loss of 42 cents per share for the same period in 2011.
The fourth-quarter figures beat the 38 center per share net loss estimated by a single analyst on Yahoo Finance.
Revenue for the fourth quarter was $107.1 million, up 6.8 percent from $100.3 million for the same period last year.
USA Truck shares fell 57 cents, or 10 percent, to close at $4.95 Thursday on the Nasdaq exchange.
The trucking company’s shares have traded as high as $9.24 and as low as $2.65 over the past year.
For the year, USA Truck reported a net loss of $17.5 million, or $1.70 a share, compared with a net loss of $10.8 million, or $1.05 a share, for 2011.
The company lost $3.3 million in 2010 and $7.2 million in 2009. Its most recent profitable year, 2008, saw income of $3.1 million.
Its revenue for 2012 was $408.7 million, down less than 1 percent compared with $411million reported for 2011.
Beckham said reduced driver turnover, better pricing on freight and the addition of new freight customers were all key factors in improvements made in the quarter.
“Perhaps our largest accomplishment during the quarter involved cutting our unmanned tractor count by more than 50 percent,” Beckham said in the release.
Base revenue per tractor was $2,720 a week, up6.7 percent compared with $2,548 for the fourth quarter of 2011, and the trucker’s fleet size decreased 2.3 percent to 2,184.
Beckham said the company has developed a strategy to increase volume in specific trucking lines during the 2013 winter freight-bidding season.
In November, the trucking company implemented a stockholders’ rights plan, or “poison pill,” to reduce the threat of a hostile takeover and changed two directors.
Board member Robert Peiser, who has experience turning around troubled companies, was appointed chairman of the board to succeed Terry Elliott. Named to the board was Robert Creager, formerly with Price Waterhouse Coopers. Later in the month, USA Truck hired consultant and longtime trucking executive Thomas Glaser as the company’s interim chief operating officer.
In late December, USA Truck fired Darron Ming, its chief financial officer.
USA Truck is a dry van truckload carrier that transports general commodities in the United States and Canada as well as into and out of Mexico through a terminal in Laredo, Texas.
Business, Pages 29 on 02/01/2013