Vail Resorts Stock Falls After Earnings

Vail Resorts (NYSE: MTN) announced fiscal fourth-quarter 2024 results after the market closed yesterday, and investors weren't impressed with the news. Revenue was down 1.6% to $265.4 million, and net loss ballooned from $128.6 million to $175.4 million, or $4.67 per share.

As a result, the stock closed the day down nearly 4%.

Revenue slightly topped estimates, but analysts were expecting a loss of just $4.26 per share. To make matters worse, the company announced a major restructuring to cut costs.

A downtrend for Vail Resorts

The fiscal fourth quarter is a slow time for Vail Resorts without the winter ski season, but investors can take some keys from what was reported. The first was Epic Pass sales falling 3% in units and dollar sales rising 3% for the upcoming 2024/2025 ski season.

What that tells us is Vail Resorts is raising prices, and customers are choosing not to buy a pass. There's a limit to the price the company can charge for passes, and if you've looked at the price of lift tickets lately, you can probably see why consumers are balking at the current asking price.

Layoffs are coming

As part of a profit improvement plan, management announced a "two-year transformation plan" that will call for cutting about $100 million in annual expenses by the end of fiscal 2026, including eliminating 14% of the corporate workforce and about 1% of operations staff.

While growth was the name of the game for Vail Resorts over the past decade, it's now about efficiency. And the company needs to get more efficient quickly, because customers aren't willing to pay more to access the slopes.

Should you invest $1,000 in Vail Resorts right now?

Before you buy stock in Vail Resorts, consider this:

The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the 10 best stocks for investors to buy now… and Vail Resorts wasn’t one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years.

Consider when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $760,130!*

Stock Advisor provides investors with an easy-to-follow blueprint for success, including guidance on building a portfolio, regular updates from analysts, and two new stock picks each month. The Stock Advisor service has more than quadrupled the return of S&P 500 since 2002*.

See the 10 stocks »

*Stock Advisor returns as of September 23, 2024

Travis Hoium has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Vail Resorts. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.