BENTONVILLE, Ark. — Propelled by a 16.4-percent revenue jump during the fourth quarter, America's Car-Mart showed that it finished its 2011 fiscal year with gains in net income, its customer base and more.

Car-Mart's fiscal year wrapped up on April 30 with net income rising to $2.54 per diluted share, including a 3 cent per diluted share charge for early pay off of debt. A year earlier, the company's net income was $2.27 per diluted share.

Company officials said their active customer base increased 7 percent during the fiscal year to more than 50,000.

For the year, Car-Mart's revenue increased 11.9 percent and management indicated same-store revenue growth came in at 7.3 percent. Its retail unit sales also increased year-over-year by 6.9 percent.

Officials pointed out their provision for credit losses for the 2011 fiscal year was 20.8 percent of sales versus 20.2 percent for prior year.

In other items from its fiscal-year performance, Car-Mart determined the principal collected as a percentage of average finance receivables was 68.5 percent versus 67.3 percent for the prior year

The company also insisted it had strong cash flow in the fiscal year with finance receivables growth of $21.4 million, capital expenditures of $4.8 million and $20.3 million in common stock re-purchases with only an $8.8-million increase in debt.

Fourth-Quarter Highlights

Before delving into commentary for the entire fiscal year, Car-Mart broke out details about its fourth-quarter performance.

The company's fourth quarter net income came in at 78 cents per diluted share versus 62 cents per diluted share for the prior-year quarter.

As mentioned, Car-Mart's fourth-quarter revenue climbed 16.4 percent to $103.4 million from $88.8 million with same-store revenue growth jumping 9.5 percent.

Officials determined fourth-quarter retail unit sales increased 12.4 percent to 9,246 units from 8,225 units for the prior-year quarter.

CEO Assesses Performance & Growth Opportunities

In assessing the 2011 fiscal year, William "Hank" Henderson, president and chief executive officer of Car-Mart, began by stating, "We are very pleased with our results for the quarter and for the full fiscal year.

"Our hard work and dedication to helping our customers succeed is really showing up in our results. It is exciting to be adding customers and expanding to great new markets," Henderson continued.

"As expected, sales volumes were outstanding for the fourth quarter as we sold over 9,200 vehicles," he went on to say. "The inventory quantity and selection at our dealerships is outstanding, and we have only seen a 3.3 percent increase in our average retail sales price when compared to last year's fourth quarter."

Unlike some franchise and independent dealers, Henderson said Car-Mart is not suffering from the wholesale inventory pinch some stores are facing.

"We are not seeing the severe shortages of used cars that other segments are experiencing," Henderson declared.

"This is a further indication of the great work being done by our purchasing agents to find good cars at good prices so that we can keep our deals affordable for our customers," he added.

And because of strong inventory and a growing quality customer base, Henderson pointed out Car-Mart's loan portfolio is faring better, too.

"Also, we are happy to report that credit losses were down both sequentially and when compared to last year's fourth quarter, as we improved our lot level execution within the collections area of the business," he noted.

"Our commitment to helping our customers succeed has always been a cornerstone of our success, and this will not change as we move forward. The benefits of working with our customers are showing up in recent credit trends," Henderson added.

The top Car-Mart executive also shared what the company has in the works as its 2012 fiscal year commences.

"We fully expect our new stores to continue to perform well and to provide a solid foundation for future top line growth. We added nine new locations in fiscal 2011, and we plan to open approximately 10 more in fiscal 2012," Henderson offered.

"Beyond that, our plans are to open new dealerships at an approximate 10 percent annual rate. Just this week we opened our newest dealership in Bartlesville, Okla., our 107th location," he added. "Bartlesville represents our 21st location in Oklahoma; a state where we have been helping customers succeed since 1992."

CFO Analysis

Jeff Williams, chief financial officer, also discussed how the company's loan portfolio is faring.

"We are pleased with our financial results, but we will continue to push for improvements into the future," Williams insisted.

"Credit losses were down to 19.1 percent of sales for the quarter, a level not seen since 2003. Much of the improvement can be attributed to outstanding collection results for the quarter," he explained.

"We collected 19.6 percent of average finance receivables for the quarter compared to 18.4 percent for the prior-year quarter. The success of our collections efforts during this critical tax refund time was key to the lower credit loss percentage, and we are already focused on continuing to push for improvements in future tax refund periods," Williams continued.

"Increased collections during this time of year help our customers succeed by helping to lower our credit losses," he added.

Williams also touched on how Car-Mart improved other elements of its operations.

"Also, as expected, we did see nice leveraging at the SG&A line for both the quarter and the full fiscal year related to volume based productivity improvements," he pointed out.

"Our balance sheet remains very healthy, and our excess availability under our revolving credit facilities was $43 million at the end of the quarter. Our continuing focus on cash flows allowed us to fund finance receivables growth of $21.4 million, capital expenditures of $4.8 million and $20.3 million in common stock re-purchases all with only an $8.8 million increase in total debt for fiscal 2011," Williams highlighted.

On the investment side, Car-Mart repurchased 157,100 shares or 1.5 percent of its common stock during the fourth quarter and 1,280,746 shares or approximately 12 percent since February 2010.

"We believe in the long-term value of our company, and we will continue to invest in the repurchase program," Williams emphasized.

"Our debt to equity ratio of 25.4 percent and our debt to finance receivables ratio of 16.8 percent continue to be strong," he went on to say. "The ratios are even more impressive when considering the fact that we have repurchased over $31 million of common stock and added approximately $21 million in finance receivables since Feb. 1, 2010."

Finally, Car-Mart's board of directors once again reauthorized the repurchase of up to 1 million shares of its common stock under the common stock repurchase program which was last amended and approved on Aug. 18.