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Speaker 1: Net profit will be significantly lower than expected. For one

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Speaker 1: of the first locally listed companies impacted by the US

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Speaker 1: tariff regime, Tourism Holdings Limit, has sent a dramatic slowdown

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Speaker 1: in bookings by its US division. Its share price fell

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Speaker 1: more than ten per cent after announcing it was downgrading

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Speaker 1: its earnings outlook. Tourism Holding's chief executive, Grant Webster, is

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Speaker 1: with me now, thanks for your time, Grant, good morning,

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Speaker 1: good morning. How much is the political issues happening, the

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Speaker 1: volatility to blame for people not buying and renting? Are these.

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Speaker 2: It's pretty hard to get into the psyche of all

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Speaker 2: the individuals, but certainly the tour operators that we work

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Speaker 2: with out of Germany certainly say their customers are saying

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Speaker 2: just not interested in going to the USA at the moment.

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Speaker 1: How big of a reduction have you seen in the US?

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Speaker 2: So look, in recent weeks our booking intakes for the

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Speaker 2: rentals division into the US are down forty to fifty percent.

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Speaker 2: So that's it's obviously prett not quite as dramatic as

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Speaker 2: COVID when borders closed, but it's a big downgrade.

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Speaker 1: So is the slowdown reflected anywhere else?

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Speaker 2: No? In fact, from a consumer confidence perspective on vehicle sales,

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Speaker 2: it is. But in terms of tourism and people actually

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Speaker 2: traveling and wanting to rent our products, all other markets

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Speaker 2: are actually up and probably realistically experiencing some benefit from

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Speaker 2: that USA situation. So people still want to travel, but

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Speaker 2: I'll go somewhere else. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I was going to say that it's not that

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Speaker 1: people aren't traveling, it's as they're choosing to go somewhere else.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, So Canada is probably the greatest beneficiary out

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Speaker 2: of that. You know, similar time frame, similar flight costs,

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Speaker 2: so forth, and so on. So luckily we've got the

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Speaker 2: business there in Canada that can get some benefit from it.

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Speaker 1: So, Grant, how has the company reacted to this? As

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Speaker 1: you mentioned, you know, you've been through this before. We've

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Speaker 1: had the GFC and COVID and things.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so look, the key thing for us is because

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Speaker 2: that vehicle sales under is down, we basically have to

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Speaker 2: adjust what we buy to replenish the fleet. So we've

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Speaker 2: already got that stock there. We're going to make sure

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Speaker 2: that we manage that well, manage our balance, you well,

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Speaker 2: which is in a good position. So really it's about

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Speaker 2: pulling back on investment. And you know, we're one company,

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Speaker 2: one very small company in the USA terms, and we're

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Speaker 2: pulling back our USA fleet investments significantly. So when you

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Speaker 2: talk about possible recessions in the US and you think

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Speaker 2: about that as one more example, it has to be

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Speaker 2: being felt more broadly across the economy now.

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Speaker 1: But grant, you're not going backwards a You're more just

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Speaker 1: making moves to sort of stay steady.

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Speaker 2: And yeah, around the rest of the world will continue

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Speaker 2: to grow, but in the USA, when you're down forty

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Speaker 2: to fifty percent at the moment in bookings, it doesn't

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Speaker 2: mean that's where we'll end up, because domestic is picking

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Speaker 2: up a bit as well. But you definitely have to

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Speaker 2: reduce your total fleet size and tighten it up. So, yes,

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Speaker 2: the net investment in capital that we have in the

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Speaker 2: US will go down in the next twelve months as

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Speaker 2: as a result of this situation.

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Speaker 1: How long until you're expecting things to pick up again?

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Speaker 2: All that is, that is a crystal ball that it is,

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Speaker 2: so you just.

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Speaker 1: Worrying about, right, just worrying about today.

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Speaker 2: No, to be to be fair, we are running scenarios

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Speaker 2: and I guess again a little bit like COVID, but

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Speaker 2: but not. It's a very very different situation. But we

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Speaker 2: are running scenarios for the for the medium and long

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Speaker 2: term from a Canada perspective where we're getting impacted by

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Speaker 2: the tariffs because all our vehicles are purchased in the US.

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Speaker 2: We have processes there where the industry is looking to

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Speaker 2: apply for an exemption to the tariffs, so forth and

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Speaker 2: so on. So we've really got a number of things

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Speaker 2: to play out yet.

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Speaker 1: Grant Webster, thank you so much for your time this morning.

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Speaker 1: Appreciated for more.

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Speaker 2: From early edition with Ryan Bridge. Listen live to news

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