Avis Budget Group Inc Q1 2021 Earnings Call Transcript

The following is excerpted from the question-and-answer section of the transcript.

Question: Aileen Elizabeth Smith - BofA Securities, Research Division - Analyst : I think some of us on the call have seen the headlines yesterday with comments from someone close to the industry talking about how rental car companies are actually going into the auction market and purchasing used vehicles in an effort to match supply to demand. From my understanding, this is something that you guys have done in the past to manage appropriate fleet levels. So from your perspective, would you say that you're being more aggressive on that front than you've been in the past? Or does it appear to be more so coming from your competitors? And can you walk us through how you get comfortable on purchasing and using and depreciating used vehicles in your fleet, particularly in comparison to how disciplined you guys are in doing that for new vehicles?

Question: Aileen Elizabeth Smith - BofA Securities, Research Division - Analyst : Great. That's very helpful commentary. And then as a follow-up question to that, around fleet cost per unit. One of the dynamics that clearly helped fleet cost per unit over the past several quarters has been significant gains on vehicles that you're selling into the auction channel as you've made efforts to de fleet. I'm sure we'll get some of this detail in the Q. But if we think about the dynamic in the first quarter, and future quarters for this year where you are de fleeting less aggressively or actually increasing the size of your fleet, are you still recording meaningful gain on sale of vehicles and capitalizing on record used vehicle pricing? Or is what we're seeing in the fleet cost per unit more a structural depreciation number?