A Tale of Two Distributors’ Earnings Reports

When distributor Tech Data reported its quarterly earnings this week, the picture was pretty bright considering the economic climate and conditions we’ve all been weathering in the past year. While Tech Data’s revenues fell 16 percent year over year (not surprising since things hadn’t really fallen off at this time a year ago), they were up 4 percent sequentially, an indication of things maybe getting a little better. And on the earnings side Tech Data reported a 59 percent increase in net income. Pretty good, even in a normal economy.

On the other hand, take a look at Ingram Micro’s most recent earnings report from the end of July. The world’s biggest technology distributor reported year over year revenues down 25 percent and a 2 percent sequential decline.

Both distributors have said they’ve walked away from deals where the pricing wasn’t right in an environment where end-customers are shopping for the best deals. But still, it seems like one of these companies may be doing better than the other one in terms of performance during the recession. The number differences may not be hugely dramatic, but they are certainly something to keep an eye on in quarters to come.