Arnold Clark reported a strong set of results for 2025 in a “difficult” market with pre-tax profits down 6.6% to £113m on turnover up 7.9% to £5.6bn.
In his first set of results as CEO of the dealer group Russel Borrie said market conditions had remained “difficult” throughout the year with cost-of-living issues and government Budget changes driving up employment costs.
He added that the UK market had benefited from the debut of new Chinese brands with “affordable new cars” and the response of the traditional carmakers who provided additional support to customers.
New manufacturers on its books for the period include Chery, Corvette, Geely, Leapmotor and Maserati.
“The introduction of the five new EV focused manufacturer brands that was announced last year to 10 of our locations helped increase our new car sales by 11%.
“Whilst embedding these new brands, we took the opportunity to relocate several brands to ensure they were situated in the most appropriate locations and expanded the number of multi-brand locations by 18%.
“However, our used car performance was impacted by the increasing affordability of new cars and despite starting the year with a positive Real Sale, used car sales were down 2% on last year.”
Borries said the introduction of an EV pay per mile road charge from 2028 will “undoubtedly have a negative impact” on demand for electric vehicles.
On the motor finance redress scheme, he said: “The final redress scheme was announced by the FCA on 30 March 2026.
“The redress scheme places the liability for any redress with the lenders rather than the brokers, as such we do not consider it likely that the group will have any liability as a result of he redress scheme.”
In the footnotes to the accounts Arnold Clark said it was defencing two Civil Actions, one in England and one in Scotland, for damages by or on behalf of individuals who data may have been stolen because of the cyber-attack on the company in December 2022.
“Both proceedings are at a very early stage in the litigation process. The company intends to strong defence both actions.
