The latest results of PostNL show that the air is draining out of the parcel bubble that expanded enormously during the corona crisis. The balance point between physical and online has shifted somewhat towards the former, and the VAT loophole for bargain-priced goods from China was closed.
Cold shower
PostNL posted excellent results during the coronapandemic as e-commerce really took off, largely out of necessity because physical shops had to close during all kinds of lockdowns. However, its latest quarterly report appears to be an unpleasant surprise for the shareholders of the Dutch postal company.
Not that the figures themselves were that bad: operating profit came in roughly as expected at 23 million euros. However, analysts had not expected a slowdown for the parcels division to this extent: that division still grew just 1.6 %, nowhere near the growth rates recorded during the corona crisis.
Stronger than expected negative impact
It goes without saying that nobody expected the bonanza to last: we too warned more than a year ago that the golden days for cheap packages (especially from China) would not last, but the turnaround now appears to be very abrupt.
PostNL CEO Herna Verhagen admits that the adjustment of the VAT rules for parcels from outside the EU (as in: from China) has dried up the wide river of packages. Verhagen calls the negative impact of that measure “stronger than foreseen”. Moreover, the normalisation of buying behaviour after the most severe period of the pandemic is also making itself felt: this explains half of the 22 million euro decrease in profit of the parcel division.
