Sunbelt/Ashtead Posts Solid First Half While Slowdown Looms

Sunbelt invested $207.3 million into the rental fleet, about a 6-percent larger investment than the first half of 2007. Physical utilization in the first half was flat at 70 percent, while second-quarter rental rates increased 2 percent sequentially from the rates experienced in the first quarter. As a result, the decline in rental yield for the second quarter relative to last year was just 1 percent, significantly lower than the 5-percent reduction in the first quarter. For the half year as a whole, yield decline was 3 percent.