Audi posts record first-half sales, but cautions on second half

Upmarket German carmaker, Audi, posted record unit sales for the first half of the year on Friday.

The automaker, however, cautioned that bottlenecks in semiconductor supplies and increased raw material costs would impact the second half.

The Volkswagen subsidiary delivered 982,000 vehicles over the first six months for sales of 29.2 billion euros ($34.7 billion), up by 43 per cent on the year.

Pre-tax profits came in at 3.875 billion euros.

Chief Financial Officer, Juergen Rittersberger, said from the company’s Ingolstadt headquarters that while he remained optimistic on the second half, he did not expect the results to be as good.

The margin on turnover reached 10.7 per cent, which is in the upper part of the target range.

The company attributed this to the strong sales figures, being able to secure good prices and positive effects from securing raw materials supplies.

Rittersberger is expecting a margin on turnover of seven to nine per cent for the year as a whole.

Stocks of semiconductors held by the company had been reduced and there could be production stoppages in August and September, he predicted.

The company would not be able to make good all the production losses incurred in the first half by the end of the year, he said.

“We will no longer see the positive effects from securing raw materials supplies in the second half,” Rittersberger said, describing the situation as “challenging”