Ferrari executives say they expect the automaker's global deliveries in 2020 to fall by between 4 percent and 15 percent from 2019 sales of 10,131 vehicles because of the coronavirus crisis.
Finance chief, Antonio Picca Piccon, told analysts on Monday that the supercar maker lost about 2,000 units of production when its factories were shut down for nearly two months, but that much of the losses could be recouped by the end of the year.
Total sales losses would be 400 to 1,500 units, depending on how the automaker’s orders develop and the pace of production until the end of the year. Ferrari unveiled five new models last year, with deliveries set to start for four of them in 2020.
CEO Louis Camilleri said that Ferrari manages its orders carefully, in part by analyzing the health of economic sectors its customers work in.
"The commercial team did a phenomenal job at analyzing geographies, industrial sectors and ultimately, our customers and clients and who is participating in what industrial sector, which in turn gave us a sense of the vulnerabilities and opportunities," Camilleri said.
Ferrari’s unit sales losses would be significantly less than many analysts are forecasting for the global auto market.
IHS Markit’s latest projections are calling for a 22 percent decline in global vehicle sales, with a drop of 25 percent in Europe, Ferrari's largest regional market. On Monday, Ferrari cut its 2020 profit forecast due to disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic, which it said would mainly hit second-quarter results.
Camilleri told analysts that there had been few order cancellations in 2020, although he said the full scope would not be known for some time. He also said that the introduction of some future models would be delayed by a number of months because of the virus crisis.
Picca Piccon said that much of the production losses could be recouped by the end of the year. The lockdown imposed by the Italian government to fight the coronavirus pandemic forced Ferrari to close its Maranello and Modena plants starting March 14. Production activities restarted on Monday and the plants will return to full production by Friday.
How much of Ferrari’s lost production will be recovered will depend on flexibility in manufacturing, and also on the desire to end 2020 with a strong order book, executives said. “That will dictate the pace of deliveries in 2020,” Camilleri said.
Picca Piccon said that Ferrari can use all available production flexibility, working Saturdays and shorter summer holidays from now to the end of the year, in order to recover at least 50 percent of lost production volume. That might not be needed, however, in a scenario where the order intake takes time to build up over the coming months as coronavirus restrictions are lifted more slowly.