THOR Industries and Winnebago Industries stocks took a beating on Thursday, after D.A. Davidson analyst Brandon Rolle said RV demand is worse than expected and companies have an excess of units on hand. THOR disagreed, but only partly.
Rolle, in his latest round of checks, took pictures of extra units stored on farmland in Elkhart, Indiana, while he found factory lots and storage yards to be completely filled. He blamed cancellations by large dealer chains and RV sellers overestimating demand for the main retail selling season – April and May – for the large inventory on hand.
The analyst cut his rating on THOR to Underperform from Neutral, while he lowered Winnebago’s rating to Neutral from Buy.
THOR’s COO Todd Woelfer refuted the claim, saying it has been careful about its production and all the units spotted are presold and waiting to be delivered. Winnebago didn’t respond to questions from Barron’s.
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