Hitachi direct.One thing that few people think about when it comes to WJX, and certainly the share price doesn't get it, is the impact of JPY CDN exchange rates. John Deere when they controlled Hitachi products floated the exchange rate with the USD but Hitachi will have much stronger control over that now. The Yen is at an all time low, and John Deere will be making their machines in North America with uber high inflation with costs in USD.
WJX is a essentially a good play on the yen/cdn exchange rate. The Hitachi product has a much higher market share in Japan than in the US despite competing with most of the same companies.
Given that we are in a young and fiesty mining bull market with electrification of the transport industries I believe strongly that WJX will be meaningfully revalued over the next 3 years.
Our new CEO is a go getter, whereas Mark Foote was more of a steady as she goes. WJX has underperformed it's potential for years, because it could.
If you as Ritchie Bros what the best machines to sell our Hitachi Excavators are a perenial favourite. With an expanding Hitachi product line, a pipeline of low inflation from Japan and an aggressive go getter at the helm I see multiples of our current price.
Most importantly last quarter only had 30 days of the new Hitachi relationship in it's grasp. We just crossed the start line in this race.