Expeditors International of Washington, Inc. (NASDAQ:EXPD) today announced first quarter 2022 financial results including the following highlights compared to the same quarter of 2021:

• Diluted Net Earnings Attributable to Shareholders per share (EPS¹) increased 23% to $2.05
• Net Earnings Attributable to Shareholders increased 21% to $346 million
• Operating Income increased 20% to $462 million
• Revenues increased 46% to $4.7 billion
• Airfreight tonnage volume and ocean container volume decreased 18% and 3%, respectively

“Given all that we have been through following the February cyber-attack, I have never been more proud of our employees’ ability to adapt – nor have I ever been more grateful to our loyal customers, carriers, and service providers for their unprecedented level of support while we worked through this crisis,” said Jeffrey S. Musser, President and Chief Executive Officer. “Our core systems are operational, thanks to the around-the-clock efforts of our entire organization. Our people performed magnificently and we are proud of the financial results, especially considering the additional expenses and reduced volumes as a result of the cyber-attack. We are extremely appreciative that the vast majority of our customers chose to keep their business with us while we worked to resolve the impact of the cyber-attack.

“All of our products suffered as a result of the cyber-attack, particularly during the first three weeks after the attack, as we quickly adjusted to a new and unfamiliar operating environment in which our core systems were taken offline to protect our network. Nevertheless, our Air and Ocean businesses both outperformed strong year-ago results, as rates remained elevated due to ongoing supply chain bottlenecks and capacity constraints, while tonnage and volumes declined principally as a result of the cyber-attack. Air freight continues to be impacted by the extreme imbalance between capacity and demand, particularly with exports out of Asia. While the cyber-attack constrained our volumes in air during the quarter, we continued to process shipments and serve our customers, particularly as shippers turned to air in an effort to get around the severe disruptions on the seas. Ocean volumes, in turn, continued to be hampered by port congestion due to labor and equipment shortages, which disrupted sailing schedules and kept rates well above historical norms. None of the issues in the air, on the water, or at the ports have appreciably improved or are likely to in 2022.”

Christopher J. McClincy, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, commented further on the cyber-attack: “As soon as we learned of the attack, we quickly shut down most of our connectivity, operating and accounting systems worldwide to protect the health of our global systems environment, and we initiated our cybersecurity incident response plan. Over the subsequent days and weeks, our response teams, in collaboration with external cybersecurity experts and law enforcement, remediated the attack. The systems impact related to the cyber-attack limited our ability to arrange shipments or manage customs and distribution activities, or to perform certain accounting functions, for approximately three weeks after the attack. While we continue to navigate residual effects and incorporate learnings from the cyber-attack, our core systems are being utilized to drive our services. I join Jeff in thanking all of our employees and partners for their exceptional performance during the most trying episode in our company’s history.”

Bradley S. Powell, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, added, “Despite our temporary systems shutdown, our employees were able to find alternative solutions to keep freight moving, although on a limited basis, until we were able to restore our systems. While we believe the bulk of the expenses related to the cyber-attack are now behind us, we expect to continue to incur additional expenses related to further system enhancements. Supply and demand in both air and ocean and are likely to remain out of balance for the foreseeable future, but we would continue to caution that should demand and rates return to pre-pandemic levels – whenever that may be – our revenues, expenses, and operating income are likely to decline from the all-time highs that we experienced in 2021.”

Expeditors is a global logistics company headquartered in Seattle, Washington. The Company employs trained professionals in 176 district offices and numerous branch locations located on six continents linked into a seamless worldwide network through an integrated information management system. Services include the consolidation or forwarding of air and ocean freight, customs brokerage, vendor consolidation, cargo insurance, time-definite transportation, order management, warehousing and distribution and customized logistics solutions.

Financial Impact of the Cyber-Attack

In the first quarter the Company incurred, as a result of our inability to timely process and move shipments through ports, approximately $40 million in incremental demurrage charges, where the Company has direct liability for this obligation. These costs are recorded in customs brokerage and other services expenses.

Additionally, in the first quarter, the Company incurred investigation, recovery, and remediation expenses, including costs to recover its operational and accounting systems and to enhance cybersecurity protections. These costs are primarily comprised of various consulting services including cybersecurity experts, outside legal advisors, and other IT professional expenses. The Company also recorded estimated liabilities for potential shipment-related claims. Total amounts recorded for the items above were approximately $20 million and are reported in other operating expenses. The Company does not expect to incur significant capital expenditures as a result of the cyber-attack.

The Company may incur additional expenses which could include third-party expenses, incremental information services costs, legal fees, or indemnities to customers or business partners. When the Company’s operating systems were down, many customers worked with other providers to meet their logistics needs, resulting in lower shipment volumes in the first quarter for which the financial impact on revenues and operating income cannot be quantified. Such costs and the ongoing impacts from the down time caused by the cyber-attack could have a further material adverse impact on the Company’s business, revenues, expenses, results of operations, cash flows and reputation. The Company is unable to estimate the ultimate direct and indirect financial impacts of this cyber-attack.

During the three months ended March 31, 2022, we did not repurchase any shares of common stock compared to the three months ended March 31, 2021, when we repurchased 0.9 million shares of common stock at an average price of $92.98 per share.

Investors may submit written questions via e-mail to: investor@expeditors.com. Questions received by the end of business on May 6, 2022 will be considered in management's 8-K “Responses to Selected Questions.”

Disclaimer on Forward-Looking Statements:

Certain statements contained in this news release are “forward-looking statements,” based on management’s views with respect to future events and underlying assumptions that involve risks and uncertainties. These forward-looking statements include statements regarding the financial and operational impact of the cyber-attack; the future stabilization of supply/demand imbalance and rate volatility; the continued unsettled operating environment due to continued scarce air and ocean capacity; elevated air and ocean pricing and an increase in demand for such services; port congestion; equipment imbalances; labor shortages; insufficient warehouse and pier space; trade disruptions; rising fuels costs; and the uneven lifting of the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions around the world. Future financial performance could differ materially because of factors such as: our ability to leverage the strength of our carrier relationships to secure space; the strength of our non-asset-based operating model; our expectation that the supply/demand imbalance and rate volatility will continue in 2022, and will stabilize over time; our ability to re-open our offices for return-to-work; our ability to continue to enhance our productivity; our expectation that the current unprecedented operating conditions will not persist long-term; our ability to invest in our strategic efforts to explore new areas for profitable growth; our ability to avoid another material cyber-attack; and our ability to remain a strong, healthy, unified and resilient organization. The ongoing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic could have the effect of heightening many of the other risks described in Item 1A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K, including, without limitation, those related to the success of our strategy and desire to maintain historical unitary profitability, our ability to attract and retain customers, our ability to manage costs, interruptions to our information technology systems, the ability of third-party providers to perform and potential litigation as updated by our reports on Form 10-Q, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These and other factors are discussed in the Company’s regulatory filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including those in “Item 1A. Risk Factors” of the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2021. The forward-looking statements contained in this news release speak only as of this date and the Company does not assume any obligation to update them except as required by law.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20220502005880/en/