After Drought & Titan Warning, U.S. Farm Equipment Sales Not So Bad After All

If you were just focused on the poor earnings report from Titan Machinery, Inc. (NASDAQ: TITN) in agricultural equipment sales this week, the report may be a one-off item.  Still, the news was bad enough that it dragged down shares of Deere & Company (NYSE: DE) which is many times the size of Titan. AGCO Corporation (NYSE: AGCO) was pulled down as well and it is much larger than Titan too.

Now we have news out of the Association of Equipment Manufacturers showing that retail farm equipment sales posted some healthy gains in the month of August.  It should be noted that all three players today are trading higher on a snapback. Yesterday’s news was even bad enough to hit the Market Vectors Agribusiness ETF (NYSEMKT: MOO), and its shares have recovered some today as well.

The one caveat we would note is that Titan’s issue that was brought up was an issue pertaining to profits more than it was to sales.  That being said, you might argue that the unit growth might have been based upon very attractive equipment prices.

It is still a bit soon to say for the current quarter’s major ag-equipment players.  There could even be a boost being tied here based upon drought insurance.  Again, that may be too soon to consider as gospel as well.

AEM membership is made up of over 850 companies and over 200 product lines in the agriculture, construction, forestry, mining and utility sectors worldwide.

JON C. OGG