BERLIN (Reuters) - German post and logistics group Deutsche Post (DE:DPWGn) confirmed its forecast for 2022 on Tuesday and said it was in a better position than rivals to cope with the coronavirus outbreak but it was too early to judge the full impact.
"Thanks to our broad geographic set-up and our comprehensive portfolio we are in a very robust position and more resilient than other companies in our sector," Chief Executive Officer Frank Appel said.
U.S. package delivery companies United Parcel Service Inc (N:UPS) and FedEx Corp (N:FDX) warned last week the coronavirus outbreak could disrupt shipment of goods in affected countries and possibly weigh on their first-quarter results.
Deutsche Post said in February the coronavirus has wiped up to 70 million euros off its operating profit in February and it would take a one-off charge of 300-400 million euros this year related to its electric van business.
On Tuesday, it said the German post and parcel business, the DHL supply chain and DHL ecommerce solutions units had only been marginally impacted by the coronavirus, but it expected more of an impact on its Global Forwarding and Express divisions.
The company said it had excluded the impact of the epidemic from its 2020 forecast for operating profit of more than 5 billion euros as it was currently unquantifiable and reiterated a 2022 target to reach an operating profit of at least 5.3 billion euros.
For 2019, operating profit rose more than 30% to 4.1 billion euros on sales of 63.3 billion euros, both slightly shy of analysts' average forecasts, and proposed a dividend of 1.25 euros per share, above analysts' average forecast of 1.20 euros.
